Morality Core
by ChillyIce
Summary: Humans would look back on their lives moments before their death. But what do Cores have? Files. Morality opened the zipped files in the back of her memory. The same files that the scientists warned would kill her. Pre-Portal AU Rated T to be safe.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Hi everyone. I'm actually very nervous about posting this. This would be my first Portal fic and although I played the game, I'm a little scared that I may not get everyone's character correctly. After reading a couple of cores-turned-human fics, I thought that I would try the opposite.

* * *

Morality Core knew what Chell was planning to do with her. She turned her purple optic to see the incinerator. She should scream and tell the human to stop, to not throw her into the incinerator. Morality should warn the test subject that the only thing that prevented GLaDOS from killing said subject was her constant input of morals. But she couldn't; her core didn't have the ability of vocalization. The wiring in her chassis didn't allow for auditory output.

Morality looked back at GLaDOS. Even from her detached position, Morality could feel GLaDOS's satisfaction at the core's impending doom. "_I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier. Just get rid of one annoyance with another," GLaDOS said smugly. _

The core with the purple optic looked to the test subject. Morality Core didn't know much of humans; everything she learned about them came from watching test subjects test. But she knew that this human was strong, maybe not neurotoxinproof strong, but strong. Morality Core heard the doors of the incinerator open. Humans would look back on their lives moments before their deaths, but a core, what do they have? Files. Morality without hesitation opened the zipped files in the back of her memory. The same files that the scientists warn would kill her. Morality could feel herself falling just as much as she noticed that she did not die from opening the files.

Names passed through her memory like a slideshow. _Aperture. Caroline. Cave Johnson. Rick. Neil. Curra. Andre. Wheatley. Wheatley. _Morality closed her optic for what would be the last time.


	2. Chapter 2

Amora held her head up high as she walked into the glass covered building. She pulled the glass door open and walked slowly to the front desk. She crossed her arms on the desk. The secretary looked up from her computer. The secretary looked at her expectantly. "Hi, my name is Amora Lovelock and I'm here to apply for the position of PR manager," the woman said pushing her black hair behind her ear.

The secretary groaned, "Just wait over there." The woman pointed to some plastic chairs that lined the wall. Amora thanked the secretary and sat down.

"Whew, I thought I was going to be late," a male voice with a slight English accent said before someone dropped himself down on the chair next to her. "I can't believe I'm here. Aperture Science. It's even bigger than I could have imagined." The man tapped Amora on the shoulder. "Hello Miss, My name's Wheatley."

Amora smiled at the charming manner the man greeted her. "I'm Amora," she said shaking his hand that he offered her.

"That's a lovely name," Wheatley said leaning back into his chair. "So do you work here?" he asked his blue eyes staring at her.

Amora smirked a little, "If I worked here, why would I be out here waiting?"

Wheatley facepalmed, "Of course, I don't know what I was thinking." He chuckled to himself. He grew quiet.

"I'm applying for a job here if that's what you're trying to figure out," Amora said. "So are you apply for the PR position too?" Amora asked.

Wheatley chuckled, "Oh no, I'm applying for the internship here. I'm going to be a scientist and do science stuff."

Amora smiled larger, "Science stuff?" She giggled. Wheatley looked embarrassed.

"Amora Lovelock?" a man asked from an open door.

"That's me," Amora said getting to her feet. "Hey, let's meet up after this and we can get a bite to eat."

Wheatley looked a little shocked. "uh.. yeah. That sounds good."

Amora gave the dirty blonde another smile and turned to the man who called her name. "You're Amora?" the man asked. Amora answered affirmative. "Caroline is waiting for you. First door on your left." Amora was going to thank the man but he left leaving her alone in the bright, white hallway.

She took a deep breath and turned to her left. She walked slowly to the first door, trying to calm her heart rate that threatened to burst through her chest. She tried not to think of the bills that were slowly building up in her apartment and the student debt that was beginning to swallow her whole.

Amora grabbed the doorknob and taking a deep breath, she opened the door. A dark-haired woman sat at a wooden desk reading a pile of papers. She looked up at Amora. "Hello, are you Ms. Caroline?" Amora asked nervously wringing her hands.

The woman's dark eyes analyzed her, "You're Amora?" The woman answered affirmative. "Sit down," Caroline said coldly.

Amora did as she was told and nervously cleared her throat. "I'm apply for the PR position," Amora began hesitantly.

"I know why you're here Amora," Caroline said. Amora tried not to shift under the woman's gaze. "I have looked through your transcript and resume," Caroline said looking back at her desk. "You don't have any previous experience in Public Relations," the older woman said looking back up at her.

Amora looked down at her hands that laid in her lap. "Yes."

"You're hired," Caroline said. "Congratulations. Report tomorrow. Cave will be very excited to meet you." Amora sat there not believing what she was hearing. "You're dismissed," the older woman said.

Amora got up too quickly nearly knocking the chair she was sitting on down. "Thank you so much. I won't let you down," Amora said. The young woman backed away and left the room.

She stood outside the door and did a little dance. She was jumping excitedly when the door in front of her opened. She barely stopped her happy dance when Wheatley appeared in the now opened door. He looked a little pale as he closed the door behind him. "Wheatley, how'd it go?" Amora asked.

"I got the internship," he said in a small voice. "I mean, of course I got the internship. I'm awesome of course and really smart."

Amora laughed, "You don't need to impress me." Wheatley chuckled. He walked ahead of Amora toward the front desk. She walked slowly after him and briefly wondered if he had forgotten about her invitation.

The door that Wheatley came from opened again. Amora looked at the door. A tall man with brown hair walked out of the room. "Howdy, young lady. Are you joining our team?" the man greeted looking down at her, his green eyes were wondering a little further south than Amora would have liked.

"Yes, I just got hired as the PR manager," Amora said. " My name's Amora."

"I'm Rick," the man greeted, "I was just going to lunch with Neil if you want to join us."

Before Amora could answer, Wheatley reappeared, "We would love to join you." Amora nodded her agreement.

Rick seemed pleased with himself, "We can all go in my car. Neil would meet us at the restaurant." The taller man led the way strutting like some action hero.

"I'm so sorry. I totally forgot that you invited me to eat with you," Wheatley said. "I was just thinking about how I get to work here every day. I should get lab coat. I bet I would look good in a lab coat. What do you think?"

Amora made a dramatic thinking face and even put a hand to her chin. She could say that he would look good in anything that he wore, but she didn't want to be so forward. "I think that it would be a great idea. You will definitely look like a true scientist."

Wheatley grinned before wiping his glasses. "I wonder where I could find a lab coat," he whispered to himself.

Amora just shook her head amused. The doors to the Aperture offices closed behind her with a near silent thud. She watched as Wheatley spoke with Rick with animated gestures. Rick motioned to a small silver car parked nearby. "Wheatley, why don't you let the young lady sit up front with me," Rick suggested as Wheatley opened the passenger door.

"Oh, yes. Of course. Sorry about that," Wheatley said stepping away from the door which slammed closed again. Amora silently chuckled to herself. Wheatley opened the door again and Amora stepped in with a quick thank you.

She looked over her shoulder to see Wheatley plop down in the seat behind her. Rick looked over his passengers to make sure they were both fastened into their seats. He started the car and whipped through the parking lot. Amora gripped the armrest as tight as she could. "So are y'all excited to start working for famous Cave Johnson?" Rick asked as he weaved around the other vehicles on the road.

"Of course, Aperture is the best. I mean, you are making great strides for science," Wheatley said excitedly in the back seat grabbing onto the back of Amora's seat to pull himself forward. Amora sat quietly. Honestly, she was happy to work anywhere; Aperture was her last hope in the small town of Alluiez, Michigan.

"What do you do in Aperture?" Amora asked when she saw that the conversation in the lulled into uncomfortable silence.

"Me?" Rick asked almost running off the road. Amora nodded once she reopened her eyes. "I'm an adventurer. I go into the dark and unknown parts of the world to find interesting material to experiment on," Rick said as he turned into a parking lot (without signaling much to Amora's annoyance.).

The three Aperture employees exited the car and entered the small café. "Hey Rick," a voice called out as a man with bright orange hair called out. The trio sat themselves next to the man.

"Is there room for us?" a cheerful woman voice asked. Without an answer, an Auburn-haired woman dropped in the empty space beside Wheatley. "Who are you? Are you new? You are actually kindof cute," the woman said quickly as she leaned closer to Wheatley. "Oh, I didn't see you there. What's your name? Are you new here too?" the woman asked turning her attention to Amora.

"Curra, one question at a time," a stern male voice said. A man with dark skin and hair pulled a chair from a nearby table to sit with Amora and the group. "I don't believe I've seen you two around the office," he started. "I'm Andre and this is Curra." The woman waved excitedly when the man said her name. Introductions were made around the table and the Aperture Science employees ordered their meal.

Amora sat quietly; she didn't want to interrupt the older employees. "So Neil, What is this new project that Cave is cooking up?" Rick asked as the waitress set down plates of food in front of everyone.

The man with the orange hair- who Amora learned was Neil- had took a large bite of his burger when Rick asked. "You won't believe it," Neil started somehow still understandable with a mouthful of food. The man paused for a moment before continuing in a softer tone, "I'm going to spaaaaace." Neil was clearly excited about going into space. "Cave wants me to collect as many moon rocks as I can," Neil continued in a normal tone. "What's he going to do with them, who knows."

"That's Mr. Johnson for you," Andre spoke up, "I feel for you Amora. I really do." Amora looked at the man confused.

"Yeah, whatever happened to the last PR manager?" Curra asked. The men around the table were silent.

"I think she quit," Rick said. The other employees left the conversation at that and concentrated on their meals. Amora's mind was running a million miles an hour; why did they talk about this position that way? She tried to focus on her food, but she could start to feel a shadow of doubt in the back of her mind.

Once done with their meal all the employees stood up to leave. Curra and Andre left first saying that they had a deadline coming up soon. Neil left next so he could get another physical for his space trip. "I could drive you back to your cars if you need to," Rick offered.

"That's nice, but I took the bus today," Amora said.

"I did as well," Wheatley added. Rick with a courteous nod to both left the café. "It was nice to meet you Amora," Wheatley said waving goodbye as he too left the café.

"Miss Amora," a voice called to her. Amora turned around to see a man in a lab coat, his black hair was sticking up in ways that seem to defy gravity. "I'm Dr. Doug Rattmann," the man said as Amora looked at the Aperture ID that was clipped to his front pocket. "Aperture is a very unique place. I hope that you are able to find your place. We tend to go through PR managers like candy," the man continued in a tone that seemed to send a shiver down Amora's spine. Dr. Rattmann smiled, "But I'm sure you will do well. Caroline is really good at finding loyal employees. Perhaps we'll see each other around."

* * *

A/N: Soo, I wanted to make the cores obvious; I think I succeeded with some, but not so much as others.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: I have only one thing to say. Well, a couple of things. First you guys are evil; with all your reviews I had to publish a new chapter (nevermind homework that could wait). This chapter is interesting. I just wanted to say that if the experiments seem tame, I know and there is a reason for that. Anyways, I wanted to thank ThoseRedLights, Caperture, and Starryskys102 for following and favoriting and reviewing. I will now respond to those reviews.

-ThoseRedLights- Thank you so much. And your review helped making this chapter to be published a lot faster.

-Caperture- I sure will try to update this fic quickly. And thank you so much.

\- Starryskys102- Yeah, Wheatley was pretty obvious given that I said his name and Morality is telling the story, so yeah they were given. You love space core? I will definitely have to put more of him. I'm pretty sure you're right in your guesses.

* * *

Amora stood in front of the door to her apartment. She reached into her purse to search for her keys. Just like every day, she had to resort to pulling things out of the purse to find the keys that, like always, fell to the bottom of her purse. Amora sighed irritated as she unlocked her apartment door.

Once inside she walked to the bathroom to remove the purple contacts she always had on. Her brown eyes stared back at her from the mirror. Amora adverted her eyes quickly; she couldn't explain it, but she couldn't stand her brown eyes. They kind of reminded her of a kicked puppy.

Amora's stomach growled loudly. She skated her way to the fridge and pulled opened the door excited to see what goodies were inside. The shelves were completely empty. Amora hung her head sadly as her stomach rumbled. She then turned her attention to the one cabinet she had in her poor excuse for a kitchen. In a pile of pink and blue laid four packets of instant ramen soup.

Amora started preparing her meal, humming a tune to herself. Once done she sat on the single chair in the apartment and ate slowly. She looked around the bare apartment thinking about the improvements she could make with the income she would receive from Aperture. She could even move to a bigger apartment. She planned out her outfit for tomorrow for when she met with Cave Johnson. Watching the sunset, she decided to sleep early to be ready for her first day at Aperture.

…

Amora walked into Aperture confidently. She waved at the secretary who still seemed annoyed at her. Amora shrugged and figured that she was just one of those people. "Miss Amora," Caroline's voice called her from the opposite side of the entrance. "If you will follow me, I'll lead you to Mr. Johnson," the woman said with a very serious voice. Caroline spun around quickly and walked down the corridor that Amora walked down the day before. Amora watched the doors she past trying to read any of their labels, but Caroline was keeping a brisk pace. The older woman stopped at the door at the end of the hallway and knocked on the door. "Mr. Johnson, Amora is here to see you," Caroline called out.

The door swung open to reveal Cave Johnson. "Thank you Caroline. Come in Amora, we have a lot to talk about," the man said.

"Sir, remember the last PR manager," Caroline said a little cryptically before leaving Cave Johnson and Amora alone.

"Ah, never mind her. Caroline is still a little sore that Teresa left us," Cave said as he crossed his arms.

"Why did she leave if you don't mind me asking?" Amora asked.

Cave shrugged, "Something about how she couldn't handle all the experiments we were doing. But rest assure, everything is okay." Amora nodded unsure, something was telling her that she should be suspicious of Cave Johnson. "We'll be heading up to the labs and see what the boys are up to," Cave said leaving his office with Amora on his tail. "Now many people will tell you that the experiments we do are unethical, but you know what I say?" Cave asked as he turned to another corridor. The older man paused and Amora tried not to squirm at the question. "I say science requires sacrifices. And if we forward science by three centuries then that gives me a happy face in my book," Cave answered his own question with a laugh.

Amora and Cave entered the elevator that was nearby. The doors nearly closed when a hand stopped the movement. Curra bounced in, " Hello Mr. Johnson. How are you feeling today?"

"Couldn't be better. I'm just giving Amora a tour of the labs," Cave said.

"Oh goodie, you'll love this place. We learn so much about science every day," Curra said as the doors closed behind her. She pushed one of the elevator buttons with her free hand. In the other was a first aid kit. "Someone in the robotics lab injured themselves, so I'm needed there," she smiled.

"Curra here is our nurse. If you feel ill go to her and she would help you," Cave said. Curra nodded pleased with his description. She then proceeded to talk about some award show she watched on the television the night before. The elevator doors opened and Curra quickly left the elevator.

Amora and Cave continued up the elevator in silence. When the doors opened again, Cave led the way out. "This here is our Polymer lab currently they are working on a quote 'green' plastic by using the sap of some tree Rick found during his last exhibition. Let's go in and see how they're doing." Cave pulled opened the door and everyone in the room straightened to stand at attention.

"Mr. Johnson," Andre's voice called as he walked into view. He pushed his goggles to his forehead. "And Miss Amora. Is there anything I can help you with?"

"If you could show Ms. Amora what you're doing and show her that it isn't lethal in the slightest, that would be helpful," Cave boomed.

"Of course, this way," Andre waved. Amora followed the taller man as he tried to explain what was going on. Amora just nodded like she understood, but in reality, she had no clue what the man was talking about. Maybe she should have paid better attention in science class. But in any case, the experiment they were performing seemed safe.

"Thank you very much," Amora said with a slight bow.

"Anytime. You can come in anytime and see what we're up to," Andre said with a smile before returning to his work. Amora retraced her footsteps until she found Cave again. He was signing a form that a man Amora never seen before that handed to him.

"Are you ready to continue?" Cave asked to which Amora nodded. "Okay, we'll head up to the next floor to visit the genetics lab." Cave walked to a staircase that was besides the elevator. The pair climbed the stairs to the next floor. "The folks in here are studying transgenetic techniques. I think they have managed to clone a mouse. Let's go in and talk with the folks here," Cave said as he walked in. Amora followed after. She stood beside him until he sighed frustrated, "It appears that the lab manager isn't here. We can come back later."

Amora followed Mr. Johnson as he climbed the stairs to the next floor. "This is my personal favorite," he said as they stepped onto the floor. Amora could tell that a majority of Aperture's finances must have been given to this department. "This is the robotics department in Aperture." Unlike the previous floors, there were multiple laboratories on this floor. Each had windows so a passersby could see what was happening within. And unlike the previous floors, this floor didn't have offices for the scientists.

"Excuse me, coming through," Wheatley's voice called out. Cave stepped aside and Amora pushed herself against the wall. The intern walked passed pushing a large metal container labeled 'liquid nitrogen'. "Good day, Mr. Johnson. Amora." With that small greeting, Wheatley walked out of sight.

"Anyways, let's go into this lab and see what they are up to," Cave pushed open one door.

Amora could see the top of Neil's head; his orange hair was very distinctive. "Mr. Johnson, it's good to see you," the scientist greeted. "I'm sure you two are curious on what we are doing here. Let me give you a tour." Neil motioned for Amora to follow him. "As you may have heard, I'm heading off to space soon. So we have to prepare everything for that trip. In this corner, we are trying to make a better rocket fuel. And here we're creating a simulation for landing. And oh look at this; it's my favorite." Amora was trying to keep up with the man ask he pointed out various instruments and thrusters and other space traveling equipment. Amora could feel her head spinning.

"Can you slow down for a minute so I can sort everything out?" she asked putting her hand to her head. "It's a lot to take in." Neil just nodded his head, but it was clear that he still wanted to talk about his space trip.

"Amora, we need to move on," Cave called out from the opposite side of the lab. Amora quickly made her way to his side. Once again the pair climbed the stairs to another floor of labs. "This is our medical lab."

"Good Morning," Rick's voice called out. He was standing outside the laboratories drinking a cup of coffee. "Mr. Johnson, we are having a bit of trouble downstairs and it needs your immediate attention." The adventurer put his cup on a small stand. "Caroline sent me to retrieve you."

"Serious what did those morons do this time," Cave shouted. "Amora, you can go back down and Caroline can show you your office. We'll have to continue the tour another time." Rick gave Amora a courteous nod before leading Cave Johnson away. "Caroline also told me to remind you to take your beeper." Amora couldn't hear Cave's response, but he didn't sound happy.

Amora returned to the elevator and pushed the button to go back to the ground floor. Caroline was already waiting for her when Amora reached the floor. "Good, you're here. Follow me," the stern older woman walked briskly to an office in the corner of the building. "This is your office. Go ahead and get to work. I need to help Mr. Johnson." Caroline left quickly. Amora sighed and went to the desk. She decided first she would look at the perception of the public on Aperture.

Amora spent the next couple of hours scanning articles about the research company. She took notes on the greatest complaints and ways to address the issue. She then called up some of the papers and organized an interview with Neil about his trip to space. It took another hour to set up this interview because Neil couldn't stop talking. Amora checked the time to find that it was 12:30. She got up from her desk and walked around for a bit.

A knock came from the door. Wheatley walked in, "Hello, Amora. Everyone is leaving to eat at the café today and they wanted me to ask if you were coming."

Amora could feel her face turning red with embarrassment; she didn't have much spending money for the rest of the week, so she was actually going to skip lunch today. "Uh.. actually I'm very busy. I should stay here," she said scuffing her toes against the ground.

"I'll be sure to tell them. Uh.. I guess I'll see you around. I mean if I do see you," Wheatley said quickly before leaving. Amora smiled at the closed door before sitting back at her desk. She couldn't imagine why she had felt so nervous before.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Hi everyone. Sorry for the slow update, but life's been pretty busy here.

-Starryskys102- Thank you for your review. I think we all smile a little when space core is in our presence.

* * *

Amora walked into Aperture excitedly just as she had for the past two months. She waved at the secretary who looked decidedly less grumpy than she did the day before. Amora went back to her office and looked at her schedule. She read through the list of tasks to do today.

It appeared that one of the local news stations heard about the interview that Neil had with the newspaper and had wanted to set up an interview with Cave Johnson and Neil to discuss implications of this project. Amora left her office to look for Cave Johnson.

She walked to his office and knocked on his door. "Who is it?" the CEO called from the other side of the door.

"It's Amora," she called out to the man in the office.

"Go ahead and come in," Cave called out and Amora walked into the room. "What can I do for you?" Cave asked the woman as she walked in.

"Channel five news wanted to meet with you and Neil before he takes off Friday," Amora said, "They might also want to speak with Andre about that 'green' plastic that he's working on."

"My schedule is open Wednesday afternoon. You can sign me up then," Cave said jolly. Amora thanked him for his time and went to search for Neil.

She found him in the robotics lab with his head in a helmet. "Neil," she called out to him and the astronaut turned to her with a grin.

"Hi, Amora. Do you like my space helmet?" he asked as he pulled off said helmet and began to clean it.

"Yes, I love it," Amora said amused at his excitement. "Will you be available to talk to some news reporters Wednesday afternoon around two?" she asked.

"What do they want to talk about?" he asked his blue eyes wide.

"Just about your trip," Amora answered. Neil calmed down and his mouth spread to a wide smile.

"I can talk about it all day," Neil said putting on his helmet again. He pulled the gold visor down and back up again to test it. "Can you believe I'm going to be in space at the end of the week?"

Amora chuckled, "It sounds like it's going to be amazing. Make sure to take lots of pictures." Neil nodded enthusiastic. "Oh, I have a present for you, but you have to wait for your going away party," Amora said as a reminder to herself to wrap the gift. It was just a simple book of star maps, but she hoped he would like it.

"You shouldn't have. That's so kind of you. Is it something I can use in space?" Neil asked excited.

Amora stopped to think about the question, "I think so. I don't know what can't you use in space?"

"Well, You can't.." Neil was interrupted with a loud bang and what sounded like gunfire from a lab across the hall. The future astronaut left his sentence hanging to inspect what had happened. Amora followed him before he turned to face her, "You probably should go back to your desk. You know, to be safe."

Amora wasn't normally a curious person and she trusted that Neil knew what he was talking about. Amora nodded and took the elevator down to her office. She didn't even think twice about the accident in the lab. She wouldn't have to worry about it unless there was bad press, but a small accident like that would be solved quickly.

She called the news station to tell the reporters that Neil and Cave would be able to speak with them. She looked up at the clock which read 11:30. She decided that now would be a good time to fill her water bottle at the water cooler.

She fiddled with the top of the water bottle as she walked to the cooler. She practice her smile before the cooler came into view. Her smile fell slightly when she realize that Wheatley wasn't getting a drink from the cooler like he normally did at this time. Not that she was keeping track of his movements or that she even cared that much. No, instead of Wheatley, Amora noticed a young girl standing by the cooler.

Amora walked up to the girl. "Hi," she called out as softly as she could trying not to scare the girl. "Are you looking for you father?" Amora asked a little unsure on how to talk with the child.

The girl's dark eyes seemed much older than her age which was a little unsettling. "You can wait in my office if you like. Everyone goes by my office at least once.. they really like the jar of candy I have in there. Do you like candy?" The girl gave Amora a look of distrust. "You're father told you not to strangers, didn't he?" Amora said realizing her mistake. "You can trust me though. I work with your father."

"Hello Amora, how's your day going?" Wheatley asked as he walked to the water cooler. "It's amazing that we always run into each other by the water cooler. It's almost like someone planned it." He crushed his used cup and tossed into the trash can.

Amora chuckled uncomfortably. "Wheatley, do you know this little girl?" She asked partially to get an answer, but mostly to change the subject. Wheatley looked at the young child.

"Oh, Hi. The name's Wheatley. So don't panic, but we're here to help you. Of course if you are scared that's okay too because that is a normal response for a child to have when two strange adults are trying to convince you to come with them," Wheatley rambled.

Amora smacked his arm before he made the girl more frightened. The girl silently chuckled at the two's actions. "Amora, what was that for? I was just trying to tell her that we're not scary and we won't try to kidnap her." Wheatley complained rubbing his arm. " Did you tell her about the candy in your office? All children love candy," Wheatley started to ramble.

The little girl walked up to the pair and tried to get their attention. Wheatley looked down to see the girl, "So you do want to go to Amora's office?" The girl nodded enthusiastically. Amora led the way to her office. She took her seat and Wheatley and the young girl sat on the pair of chairs on the other side.

Amora pushed the jar of candy on her desk to the girl. The woman then continued to look through her desk to find blank paper and pencils. Before long the three of them were drawing and having a good time. Though the girl never spoke, Wheatley and Amora were able to fill the office in conversation.

"See, Dr. Rattmann, I told you she would be fine," Caroline's voice said as she opened the door.

"Chell, I was so worried about you," Dr. Rattmann said as he too entered the room. Chell got up from her chair to give the man a hug. He looked up at the two Aperture employees. "Thank you for watching her." Both told him that it was no problem. Dr. Rattmann took Chell away and Caroline followed after. Wheatley left telling Amora that he had to return to work.

….

Amora left the office on time and hurried to the bus stop. The bus ride was uneventful as usual and Amora got back to her apartment just in time to eat dinner before her favorite television program started. She sat there entranced in trying to figure out the murderer on the show when a breaking news report interrupted. "Seriously?" she shouted at the television, "Give me my show back."She dramatically threw herself on the couch and missing the introduction to the report. The news station showed a reporter in front of a burning apartment complex. Amora sat up to listen. The reporter said that there was an explosion and that was what started the blaze.

A knock came from her door. Amora tore her gaze from the television for a moment to get the door. She opened the door quickly while still trying to keep an eye on the report. Wheatley stood in the hall holding a small box of items. His white lab coat was charred and burnt on the edges. "Wheatley, are you alright?" she asked concerned. She allowed him to come into her apartment.

"Yes, as well as the situation allows," Wheatley said sitting on one of Amora's new chairs. He looked to the television. "Oh, I guess you heard about it already."

Amora looked back at the television. "You lived there?" she asked trying to connect the dots.

"Yes, and you see. Remember when I said last week that I wanted to take one of the projects I was working on home? I ignored your advice and took it anyways. And it was going well, very well. I nearly finished in fact. But uh.. today when I went to get some last minute materials, things got a little explosive." Amora stood in shock.

"Have you talked to the arson experts? They'll be wanting to know what started the blaze." Amora rubbed her temples at a suddenly appearing headache. "Wheatley, this is going to be horrible. I better start working on a way to regain Aperture's good name." Wheatley looked upset at her rant which made her feel guilty for being so upset. Amora decided to try to calm down. "Hey, at least you're safe. And you told me as soon as you did."

"That wasn't the only reason I came over here. Remember when you said that that I could come over any time?"

Amora felt her jaw drop. "What?!"She shouted in disbelief.

"I mean. I could find somewhere else to stay for the night, but.."

Amora held up her hand to stop him."You can stay until you get back on your feet but no longer. You can pull the bed out of the couch to sleep on." The woman walked away shaking her head. "Good night Wheatley," she said trying not to sound as angry as she felt.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: I am so sorry this took so long. School has been crazy. Anyways, I'm going to list the cores with their human counterparts at the end of the chapter. There is also a new character that I introduced in this chapter that relates with a character from the Portal universe. First one to guess who it is gets cake. :)

Thank you AudaciousAJ for adding this fic to your favorites. And thank you aperturecomics for following this fic.

-Wheatley the Legend- I read your review and got a good chuckle out of it. I actually didn't think of that when I came up with her name. This was my thought process: I need a name that sounds like Morality. hmm, how about Amora. not only does it sound like Morality, but it sounds like heart in Spanish. and morals come from the heart, right? That and if you put the initial from her last name you get: Amora L. or amoral.

-Starryskys102- Thank you so much for your support. Your reviews always make me smile. In my head canon, Chell is Mr. Johnson's and Caroline's child who was adopted by Dr. Rattman. Heard it from some youtuber and it made sense in my mind so I'm sticking to it.

* * *

Amora woke up to the sound of the fire alarm blaring. Her eyes opened as the sound ripped her dreams apart. The woman scrambled out of her bed barely catching herself before she fell flat on her face. The sprinklers overhead started to rain on her making her dark hair and clothes stick to her face and body.

The woman panicked and she ran out of her room. She paused at the scene that laid in front of her in her small kitchen area. Wheatley was batting a small plume of smoke with a dish rag. He was rambling to the smoke and to alarm. "Shh, you're going to wake up Amora," he shouted to the ceiling. "And stop smoking. There's nothing left to burn," Wheatley continued to shout.

"Wheatley, do you like to set things on fire?" Amora asked slightly amused at his actions and partially upset at the man. She found it very hard to stay mad at the accident prone man.

Wheatley spun around quickly to face the woman. He darted his eyes from hers. "I… uh… I wanted to thank you for letting me stay here. You really didn't need to and I'm ..well. I'm very grateful. But then something started to burn and then the alarm went off."

Amora sighed, "There was no need to make me breakfast. I'll get it myself. Just don't anything. I'm going to call the management and see if they can turn off the sprinklers." She crossed her arms in front of herself.

"Uh, yeah that's a good idea," Wheatley admitted sheepishly.

Amora went back into her bedroom and called the management and after a half hour the alarm was turned off. The woman got dressed quickly and started to hang up her bedsheets and other fabric items so they can dry. Amora left her room with everything drying.

"Wheatley are you ready to go?" Amora called out as she exited the room. She found the blonde man mopping the floor.

"Oh, um. Yes I'm ready to go," He answered and followed Amora out of the apartment. "Amora, I'm so sorry for this morning," Wheatley said again.

Amora laughed, "Don't worry about it. Honestly, it was a good alarm. I have been looking for something that could wake me up on time." She gave him a smile. "So what are you up to in the lab now?"

"You should come by and see it. We're working on this machine that can gather light and focus so that you can make a bridge. It's not going well, but maybe in a couple of years we can get it to work," Wheatley started to explain. He got silent for a moment. "I can't believe Neil is going to space. He seems very excited about it," Wheatley changed subjects.

"Well, he always wanted to be an astronaut," Amora explained remembering a previous conversation with the space enthusiast. "He said he couldn't join NASA because of his poor eyesight, but Cave pulled some strings to get him to space."

"Cave is a good guy, you know. I don't know of a single person in Aperture that doesn't respect him," Wheatley said as the pair entered the bus.

Amora agreed with Wheatley. Cave's charisma had all of Aperture's employees standing in awe of their employer. Everyone that Amora spoke with told her some story how Aperture was their home away from home and how the staff were their family. She was still new to Aperture but she could definitely feel what the other employees spoke about. "I think he's great. No one else could get so many different personalities to work together so amorously," Amora agreed with Wheatley.

The bus stopped in front of Aperture and the pair exited. In front of Aperture there were a pair of police cruisers. "Amora, what should I do?" Wheatley asked.

Amora barely heard the question as she was transfixed with the flashing lights. She could feel her heartrate increase and her stomach becoming sick. "Amora?" Wheatley called out.

Amora snapped out of it at the sound of her name. She looked at Wheatley whose blue, too blue, eyes looked at her in concern. "Honesty is the best policy, Wheatley. Just explain what happened. I will take care of the fallout." Wheatley looked unsure but Amora gently nudged him forward.

She stood behind Wheatley as the officers questioned him. She gave the officers an uncomfortable smile whenever they looked her direction. After Wheatley gave his spill, the officers left. "Well, that wasn't too bad," Wheatley said as the police cruisers left the parking lot.

Amora frowned slightly. "We're going to have to talk to Mr. Johnson about this. Aperture is probably going to have to pay for the damages caused," she walked into the office with Wheatley behind her.

"Thank you Amora, you know for being with me," Wheatley said in a small voice.

Amora nodded, "You're very important to me Wheatley. I..I.. you're my best friend. So I'll be by your side no matter what." She laughed at her sudden seriousness. "I'll see you later after I break the news to Mr. Johnson."

"Perhaps we can go to the new cafeteria that Mr. Johnson built. He hired some new pastry chef," Wheatley suggested.

"Sounds good. I'll meet you there at noon," Amora said waving good-bye to Wheatley.

…

Amora left Mr. Johnson's office confused. While he did seem upset at the news of a possible lawsuit, he blew it off like the bad press didn't matter him. She was thinking about what he said about forwarding science and that science isn't always safe. These words shouldn't have bothered her; after all Aperture was a research facility.

She bumped into somebody jolting her out of her thoughts. "I'm so sorry," she apologized picking up some strange mechanical thing off the floor.

"I recommend that you watch where you are walking," a slightly arrogant voice said grabbing the object from Amora. She gave the man in the pink sweater-vest a smile. The brown-haired scientist was very unfamiliar which confused Amora; she thought she knew everyone that worked in the labs upstairs.

"Of course, I'm sorry. I was just deep in thought," Amora said. "I don't think we have met before. I'm Amora. I'm the PR manager."

The man looked slightly interested in this. "My name is Craig." Craig must have thought that this was enough to settle the conversation and started to continue down the hall.

Amora followed after the man. "So which lab do you work in?" she asked keeping pace with the man that was about her height.

"I work downstairs," Craig answered matter-of-factly. Amora stopped in her tracks; there wasn't any floors beneath the one she was on. She was going to question Craig more, but he had disappeared. The woman frowned, but decided she could find out later about this mysterious downstairs lab.

Amora walked to her office to find a dozen missed calls. She quickly called back and answered any questions. She was in the middle of a call when Wheatley entered her office. She held up a hand to indicate him to wait. Amora ended her call and hung up the phone.

"How can I help you?" she asked the man.

"I just wanted to thank you again for helping me," he started and he brought a bag out from behind his back. "I was talking to Rick and he said that the best way to show a woman your appreciation was to give her flowers or chocolates. Well, the nearest flower shop is in the next town over. So I just got you chocolate. I don't know if you like chocolate, but I thought it was the best choice."

Amora smiled at the sweet gift, "Oh, thank you Wheatley. I do have a bit of a sweet tooth." She took the bag from him and took out a piece of chocolate. She put it in her mouth.

"That's good. I didn't want another mix up like breakfast this morning," Wheatley continued. "I am truly sorry for that as well." Amora laughed and grabbed another piece of chocolate. She bit into it and to her surprise there was peanut butter in the center. Her smile left her face as she could feel her throat tightening and starting to itch. She tried to find her purse quickly spinning around making herself dizzy. "Amora, is everything okay?" Wheatley asked as Amora lost her balance and fell to the floor.

Amora could feel panic set in as it became harder to breath. She pointed franticly to her purse and Wheatley quickly grabbed the item and opened it. He dumped all the contents on the floor and Amora spotted her Epipen quickly. Without a pause she injected the epinephrine into her thigh.

She could feel her heart start to race as the epinephrine started to take effect. The door to her office swung open and Curra was in the room. The nurse was beside Amora instantly, asking Wheatley question after question. "Amora, can you hear me?" Curra asked.

Amora nodded her head, not trusting her voice. "I'm so sorry Amora. I should have asked about any allergies," Wheatley said somewhere far away. Amora nodded her head and closed her eyes.

When she opened them again she was reclining in Curra's office. "That was exciting," Curra's voice said from the other side of the room. The other woman seemed out of breath. "I got you stabilized, but I want you to rest for a while." Curra gave Amora a smile. "You can speak right? No serious brain damage?"

Amora chuckled. "I don't think I would notice the difference," she answered hoarsely.

Curra pulled a chair beside Amora. "That Wheatley. Ever since he came, my office has been so busy."

"He is a little accident prone. Well, very accident prone," Amora agreed.

"Oh, I just remembered," Curra shouted startling Amora. "Caroline and I have come up with an idea to make a calendar for all the Aperture employees." The woman got up excitedly. "We were going to call it "the ladies of Aperture". We're going to need models and I was wondering if you wanted to be one?"

"I don't think I'll be right for the part," Amora answered a little embarrassed at the thought. Granted she knew that there were not many woman that worked in Aperture, so it would be nice to help her friends.

Curra frowned, "We need you. The only models we have are Caroline, myself, and Dr. Rattman's assistant, Cici Rubik." The nurse stuck out her bottom lip in a comical display. "It's a great way to get attention from the male personal. Cici is hoping to get Dr. Rattman's attention and Caroline wants Mr. Johnson's." Amora was about to refuse again. "I know about your little crush. Don't worry, I won't tell. I think you two are too cute," Curra added quickly which caused Amora to blush.

"If I say okay, you won't say anything to him?" Amora asked. Curra nodded her head enthusiastically. "As long as I don't have to wear anything ridiculous, I don't see why not."

* * *

Here are all the cores we've been introduced to.:

Morality-Amora

Wheatley- Wheatley (obviously)

GLaDOS- Caroline (once again obviously)

Adventure- Rick

Space- Neil (I didn't know that his given name was Kevin. Neil made more sense to me like Neil Armstrong)

Curiosity- Curra

Anger-Andre

Fact- Craig

Now there's one name I dropped in this chapter: Cici Rubik. I'm a little too proud of this name. Once again she is a "character" from Portal. Thank you for reading.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: *slowly peaks up from behind my desk* I'm truly sorry that this took so long to upload. I had a lot on my plate that now has been cleared. Anyways, the updates should come faster. I think. So enough about me. I hope you are all doing well. Thank you LunaFan521 for not only following and favoriting this fic, but myself as well. You are awesome. Thank You FoxiiFur

-LunaFan521- Yeah I was laughing when I wrote the quote you mentioned. It just hit me when I was typing that scene and the line just made too much sense not to put in there.

-RedactedRiot- Thank you so much for reviewing. Thank you for your advice and I have and will continue to try to incorporate your advice about Wheatley. I honestly knew I wasn't hitting the nail on the head with him, but hopefully this chapter is closer to his actual character. As far as the Aperture employees, I thank you for your advice, but the fact they are so normal was a point that I wanted to make. In my headcanon and in this fic, Aperture appears normal from the "surface". This is why most of the experiments that occurring above ground are fairly calm. But below the surface, let's just say that things get interesting. Each of the employees reflect this. Thank you for your constructive criticism

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Amora was going to kill Curra. All the moral implications aside, Amora decided that the nurse had to go. How dare the other woman make her wear this ridiculous pink, frilly disaster. Amora tried to fix the dress so it wouldn't irritate her skin. "You look absolutely adorable," Curra shouted from across the dressing room.

Amora gave the auburn-haired woman a fake smile trying not to indicate how much she hated the atrocity Curra suggested she wear. "This is very nice, Curra, but I think we should dress in according to the month," a blonde woman said as Curra held up an equally monstrous piece of fabric.

"Cici, that's a great idea," Curra said excitedly. "Amora, get out of that dress and we'll find you something else." Curra skipped out of the dressing room. Amora sighed and stepped back into the dressing room.

"Hey Amora, it's nice to actually have time to speak with you," Cici said from outside.

"It's nice to talk to you too. I know Dr. Rattmann and you have been very busy working on some sort of miniature stasis chamber,"Amora said as she exited with her own clothing on.

"Did you want to see a diagram of it?" Cici asked excitedly already reaching into her purse. Amora walked over to the other woman to look at the drawn diagram. It looked like a simple cube with a single heart in the center of each side.

"It looks very…small," Amora pointed out eyeing the scale that Cici wrote in.

"Well, that's the point. They wouldn't take up much space and could be held in a person's house," Cici said looking at her drawing lovingly. "Imagine all the patients with incurable illnesses. They can just rest in the stasis chamber and be opened when a cure comes along."

"That sounds nice, but what if the cures aren't found till decades later?" Amora asked. Cici looked at the woman as if unsure what Amora was saying. "This person would still be alive when all their family has grown up or possibly have died. I know I wouldn't want to wake up and know that everyone I care about was dead."

Cici shook her head, "But this could save their lives. Maybe whatever cure would be found quickly. And this stasis chamber would be useful for people waiting for an organ transplant."

"You're right. That does sound nice for the people on the transplant list. Well, you won me over. When will the first prototype be ready?" Amora asked.

"In a couple of months. We'll set up a demonstration for Mr. Johnson and then it could hit human trials," Cici said.

"So this is where you have been hiding," Caroline's voice said as she came into the hall of dressing rooms. "So what dirt does Curra have on you?" Caroline asked amused. Both women answered ' none' quickly. Caroline chuckled lightly. "Well, I wouldn't be so positive about that. Curra has her nose in everything that goes on in the office. In case you were thinking about breaking company policy." Amora took a slight step back unsure if the older woman had threatened her.

Once Curra returned the women continued to shop for the clothing they would need and after two hours of conversations and laughs they left. The women agreed that they would meet the next day and then set up Neil's going away party.

Amora left the group with a small wave and telling Cici that she will be going to her lab to check in on the stasis chamber. Curra had shouted out to Amora that she should visit the lab Andre worked in. With these meetings added to her mental calendar, Amora boarded the bus.

She climbed the stairs to her apartment slowly. She wasn't so sure if she wanted to see Wheatley at the moment. It wasn't that she was mad at him for nearly killing her with the peanut butter; she wasn't sure if she was ready for his rambling. Amora did find it adorable how he couldn't straightened his thoughts into a concise understandable sentence, but she really didn't want to think about how foolish she was not to ask what was in the chocolates. And dwelling on the incidence this morning would just be embarrassing. Amora sighed but unlocked the door and entered her apartment.

She was looking at the floor when a sweet mechanical voice called out, "There you are." Amora looked up quickly to see a white oval shape on three legs. Time seemed to slow and the object opened its sides revealing what Amora guessed to be some sort of gun barrels. Amora screamed in fear and curled up in a ball. She could feel herself hyperventilating as she hid her face from the machine.

"Apple! Apple! Apple!" Wheatley shouted.

The killing machine's sweet voice spoke again, "Sleep mode activated." Amora lifted her face from where it was hiding in her arms. She watched as Wheatley stood up from where he was sitting cross-legged on the ground.

"Did you learn nothing from the last time you brought a project home?" Amora asked still on the floor transfixed on the killer machine.

"Oh you mean the turret. There's nothing to be alarmed about. I haven't loaded it yet," Wheatley said as he pulled off the cover. "So we're perfectly safe. Yup, it would have just tried to fire its empty guns. I wonder if it would get upset when it realized that they were empty. But of course they don't have emotion because they are very simple AI's. They don't even feel pain…Well, they have a mock simulated pain so I guess it's real to them."

"You designed these killers?" Amora said still trying to recover from shock. Her voice was almost as shaky as her body.

"Well, part of it. I was the one who came up with the idea for them to target any moving object." Amora had to raise her eyebrow at this. "I also was the one who came up with the secret deactivation word. You know, so no one who shouldn't be shot wouldn't be shot. I think it is a brilliant word: Apple. No one could guess it looking at the turret. I was getting my lunch and the nice cafeteria lady, the one who was a pastry chef, Paisley, she had made fresh apple pie and I thought that the word apple would have been a brilliant deactivation word."

Amora sat there still shaking staring at the man in disbelief. She got up slowly her legs were wobbly underneath her. She was walking slowly past Wheatley who was now poking at something inside the turret. The blonde man straightened quickly causing the turret to wobble unsteadily. "Amora, are you okay?" he asked almost tripping as he reached to lay a hand on her shoulder. Amora just shook her head. "Well, that wasn't a bright question. You nearly died after eating that chocolate. Or maybe it wasn't the chocolate. It might have been all the stress you have been under lately." Amora could feel anger starting to bubble. She always tried to be patient and kind, but she at least expected someone else to care about her. And Wheatley was here ignoring the fact he traumatized her and nearly killed her in one day. She didn't think when she turned sharply on her heel and slapped the man across his face.

Wheatley's eyes were wide in shock and confusion. "Of course I'm not okay," Amora growled. "You nearly killed me a total of three times today. You nearly burned down my apartment. Then you nearly poisoned me and you tried to fill me with lead using Aperture equipment." Amora found herself standing on her toes trying to even their differing heights. She had to ignore how his too blue eyes looked hurt.

"Amora, there isn't any reason to be mad. You're perfectly healthy now. And did I say how great you look? A perfect picture of health. Maybe a little pale looking, but perfectly healthy-"

"You have this night, but you are leaving in the morning and not coming back," Amora said putting her foot down and storming into her room. She slammed the door a little harder than she intended. On the other side she allowed herself to cry. She couldn't explain why the tears ran down her face. Maybe because she was willing to do nearly anything for the man on the other side of the door and he couldn't even be concerned for her safety or even listen to her advice. On top of that, she couldn't believe that she lost her temper like that. She was supposed to be the kind one, the patient, the caring. Amora lowered her head. Maybe she was fooling herself when she labeled herself with those attributes.

* * *

A/N: So this chapter got out of control quickly. Anyways, LunaFan you were correct CiCi is Dr. Rattmann's companion cube. Question of the Chapter: Do you think Amora is over-reacting? And can you blame her for being upset?


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: Hi everyone, I'll just like to say thank you Rhinokitty for following and favoriting this fic. And Thank you OpticalBudgerigar for favoriting. I hope you enjoy this chapter.

* * *

To say that the morning started awkwardly would be an understatement. Amora left her bedroom to see Wheatley eating a bowl of cereal. He looked up at her and opened his mouth as if to speak but shut it quickly. Amora was not as angry as she was the night before, but she didn't want to apologize. She thought that Wheatley should be the one to do it and she could be stubborn enough to make him. Amora went to her cabinet and pulled out her favorite cereal; hopefully the amount of sugar in it would cheer her up.

The two Aperture employees sat there in tense silence eating their cereal before leaving at the same time. They didn't speak to each other on the bus ride to the Aperture Labs. Amora left quickly to her office to keep from talking to the other. After an hour of phone calls, she decided to go visit Andre's lab. Amora entered the elevator and pushed the button to the appropriate floor. "Wait. Hold the door," Curra's voice shouted. Amora listened to the call for help and Curra zipped into the lift. "Whew, that was a close one."

"Did someone get hurt already?" Amora asked as Curra settled into the elevator.

"No, I just want to see my Cuddly Bear," the nurse said.

"Your..Cuddly Bear?" Amora repeated slowly, feeling confused.

Curra nodded enthusiastic, "Andre. He and I have been dating for the last six months."

The doors to the elevator opened. Curra bounced out with Amora following behind her. Amora was a little jealous of how happy the other woman looked to be seeing her boyfriend. Curra swung the door to the lab open and Amora tried to catch it so it wouldn't hit the wall.

A loud crash that didn't come from the door caught Amora's attention. "What's this?" Andre's voice shouted loudly. Amora watched as the taller man threw a beaker of blue goo. The blue material painted other beakers and glassware. When covered with the blue goo, the glassware started to bounce about and shattering. "How can we build anything out of this?" Andre continued to shout at the other members of the lab.

Amora took a step back a little frightened by Andre's anger. Curra, on the other hand, held her head up high. "Andre," the nurse said calmly. The man lowered his fists and noticeable became calmer. "Now, remember. Just breath," Curra said taking a couple of breaths followed by Andre taking calming breaths.

The taller man exhaled one more time before turning his attention to the blue goo. "I'm sure we can find some use for this," he said as he motioned for one of the other scientists to clean up the mess.

"That's the spirit," Curra said pumping her fist. "I'm sure you can use that pudding-stuff. Oh, which reminds me. Paisley is baking cake for lunch today at the cafeteria. So we should eat there. What's that over there?" Curra rambled pulling Andre after her asking questions about everything in the lab. Amora just stood back for a moment before climbing the staircase to reach the robotics floor.

She walked down the hall silently while she searched for Dr. Rattmann's office. "Amora," Cici called out as she opened the door before the woman could open it. The blonde gave her a smile, "You came. Doug is out right now and won't be back till after lunch."

Amora returned the smile, "I could come back after lunch… Do you want to eat lunch with me? I was just going down to the cafeteria."

"Thank you. I think I will like that," Cici said and the two women went down the stairs to the ground floor. Amora quickly got her food and found a table. Cici sat down across from her. "I'm so glad that Mr. Johnson built this cafeteria. It's a lot easier to eat here and get back to work."

Amora nodded her agreement, "How did your meeting with Mr. Johnson go?"

"Perfect, he gave us the go ahead for human trials," Cici said almost dropping her fork in her excitement.

"Hello, ladies," Rick said plopping himself next to Cici. "I see that both of you have a sweet tooth." The man pointed to the two slices of cake. Whatever pickup line the adventurer was going to start was interrupted when Neil sat down next to Amora with his space helmet on.

"Hi Amora, Cici, Rick. I decided that I should try out this new cafeteria before I go into space," the astronaut said his visor down which blocked his face.

Amora reached over and pulled the visor up, "you're not going to be able to eat if you have your helmet on."

"I'm practicing for when I go into space," Neil said closing the visor again. Amora shrugged and watched as he tried to figure out how to eat around the helmet.

"Have I ever told you ladies of the time I went hunting for jaguars in the jungle?" Rick asked the two women. They both shook their head in a negative response. This lead Rick to tell a tale of danger and intrigue. Amora was pretty sure that half of it was fiction.

"Space!" Neil shouted randomly jolting up indicating that he fell asleep during Rick's story. Amora and Cici started laughing at the expense of the men.

"Neil, you ruined the perfect story. And how could you fall asleep?" Rick said upset crossing his arms.

Neil shrugged and apologized for ignoring the other man's story. "I think I heard this story before," Neil said, "And it isn't about space." Amora looked down at her food snickering at the two men.

Rick grumbled something that the woman couldn't hear. "Neil, you must be pretty excited to be leaving for space tomorrow," Amora said trying to distract the two men.

Neil nodded his head. "It's going to be amazing. It's space how can it not be amazing?"

"What's your favorite thing about space?" Cici asked.

"Mine is space," Neil said taking a forkful of his meal and stuffing in under his helmet. The other three gave each other a concerned look as the astronaut dissolved into meaningless phases about space.

….

Amora sat back as Neil's party was in full swing. She watched as each of her co-workers drank various alcoholic beverages. She personally didn't understand why any reasonable person would want to lose control over their actions, but she did find it amusing to watch said people. Amora watched as Caroline and Cave disappeared into some office. She didn't have to be a genius to know what the two were doing.

Amora caught sight of the scientist she met the other day. His name was Craig if she remembered correctly. The woman snuck up to the man as he was taking a drink. "Hi, Craig," Amora said quickly.

The man lowered his cup; he looked at her confused. "My name's Amora," she introduced herself again.

Craig looked uninterested. Amora looked around awkwardly trying to think of something to talk about. "Craig is a very interesting name," Amora began mentally screaming at the ridiculous sentence.

"According to most advanced algorithms, the world's best name is Craig," the scientist said matter-of-factly.

"That's..very…interesting," Amora said slowly unsure what to say to that. "So there's lab downstairs?" she asked randomly.

"Yes, that's where all the human testing is going on," Criag said bringing his drink to his mouth again.

"Like Cici's stasis cube?" Amora asked excited that she figured out what the scientist was saying.

"Later yes, but currently my project is ongoing," Craig said.

"What is it about?" Amora asked leaning forward interested in what the scientist was going to say.

"I'm studying how mantis DNA…"

There was a large crash and Amora turned to see that the refreshments on the table were scattered with their platters on the ground with Wheatley in the center of the mess. There were a couple of chuckles from the other guests.

Leaving her informant behind, Amora hurried to Wheatley's side. "Are you okay? You didn't hurt yourself when you fell, did you?" she asked concerned. The man's blue eyes looked up at her. She could tell that he was expecting her to shout at him.

"No, luv. I'm doing fine. Mostly fine. Maybe slight bruising where I fell. Hopefully there is nothing broken. That would be pretty embarrassing. To have broken bones by falling on the floor," Wheatley rambled. Amora chuckled, but didn't say anything as she begun to pick up the food that laid on the floor.

"I doubt you could break any bones from that fall Wheatley," Amora said chuckling. She almost wanted to remind herself that she was mad at the man, but gave up on that task because it seemed impossible. She couldn't stay mad at him long.

"You never know I could have weak bones," Wheatley paused and then gasped, "What if I'm bleeding internally? I do feel something wet on my stomach." Amora looked at his shirt which was soaked with what appeared to be the punch.

Amora would have told him such but she started to laugh. It wasn't just a chuckle but a full laugh that had her sides aching. "It's not nice to make fun of someone who's dying, Amora," Wheatley said a little upset. Amora sat herself down beside him slowly catching her breath. After several minutes, Amora finally convinced Wheatley that he wasn't going to die.

"Wheatley, I thought you were going to be careful," a stern voice said. Amora looked up to see a platinum blonde woman with bright blue eyes.

"Oh hi Paisley. Amora, this is Paisley. She's the person who is in charge of the cafeteria," Wheatley said getting to his feet. Amora gave the other woman a smile as she too got up from the floor.

"Wheatley, we are still on for dinner, right?" Paisley asked flipping her perfect hair off her perfect face. Amora wasn't grumbling under her breath.

"Yes, I made reservations at that fancy restaurant that you said you wanted to try. I heard that it has very good food. It was very difficult to even make the reservations. I had to call multiple times and the person on the other side finally got annoyed enough to let us in. I know that the last place we went to wasn't up to your liking. I liked the place before but I did have to agree that the people do over salt their food. They did serve really good burgers though, but you're a vegetarian so you didn't get to eat them."

"They shouldn't be cooking. They disgrace the culinary profession. They didn't have a single rhubarb," Paisley said with a scoff, interrupting Wheatley. Amora thought to herself that she would never interrupt the man; it was plain rude and bad manners.

"So you two have been seeing each other a lot then?" Amora asked cautiously.

"Yes, or no. We've been eating dinner together since Paisley came. Which hasn't been that long. We've been to nearly every food place in this small town and now we're expanding our reach. That's not saying much since there is only a handful of restaurants here," Wheatley started and was beginning to list the places where they ate.

"I still insist that we go to my place and I would cook us a meal," Paisley said.

"That sounds…nice," Amora choked out with a fake smile, "You two have…fun. I'm going to talk to Neil. It was…nice to meet you, Paisley." The woman left quickly walking through the cafeteria to where Neil sat in a chair.

"Good evening, Amora," Neil said looking up from the star map she had given him.

"Hi Neil. Do you like your gift? I'm sorry it isn't much," she said clasping her hands together.

The red-head looked up, "I love it. Look there's Centaurus, Canis major, Draco, and Orion." He pointed to the stars.

"I've never been good at seeing the constellations. To me they always look like a bunch of dots," Amora admitted.

Neil looked up at her in horror. He seemed to calm enough to say, "It's just a matter of connecting the dots. Come on, I'll show you." He looped on of his arms around her and led her outside of the office building.

Being in such a small town, the night sky was glittering with stars without the interference of lights. Neil let go of her arm and looked around. He turned her slightly and pointed above. "You see the Big Dipper, right?" he asked.

"That's the only thing I see," she said. Neil guided her gaze to trace out Ursa Major. For an hour, Neil traced constellation after constellation while Amora looked on amazed. Amora then thanked him and wished him luck on his trip.


	8. Chapter 8

A/N:Hi everyone, having a little writer's block so I'll apologize ahead for this chapter. Thank you Portalfan4351 Returns for following and favoriting not only this fic but myself as well; this brightened my day when I found out. Thank you OpticalBudgerigar for following this story. Thank you kiuna 11 for adding this fic to your favorites. Thisname ismyusername, thank you for following and favoriting.

-Portalfan4351 Returns- Thank you so much for your kind words. I got your review on when I was having a bad day and it definitely turned that day around for me. So a little personal, but honestly thank you. I may ask you to direct me to these four other fics so I could draw ideas and perhaps get some insight into characterizations. Ah yes, Paisley. I actually was debating whether to put cake core in her, but she showed up. Interesting information: I didn't want another name to start with 'c' so instead of finding a name similar to cake I found a name similar (at least in my head) to 'Pastry'.

-guest-Thank you so much. It is almost summer, but I got myself a summer job, so updates may not be as fast as I would like them.

* * *

Amora sat silently in the vehicle. She should say something to the two people in the front seats, but there was something about the senior employees that made her nervous. She finally gained the courage. "Mr. Johnson, where are we going?" she asked looking to the man who was driving.

"Some people don't understand science," Mr. Johnson said in his booming voice. "We are going to teach them."

"To answer your question, we're going to the airport and then to the Senate," Caroline said. Amora thought about this. The explanation sounded like it would be a very serious problem.

"Are we offering the upgraded turrets as military androids?" Amora asked, making what seemed like the most logical conclusion. The two in front looked at each other and Amora wished she understood the unspoken message.

"We are going to talk to the senators. Well, you will be doing the talking," Caroline said turning slightly to look at her.

Amora could feel the blood drain from her face. Amora's first question was going to be 'why me?", but she stopped herself. "What do you want me to say?"

"Just tell the truth," Caroline said, "you are good at that." Amora remained silent as the vehicle continued its trek to the airport.

The Aperture employees and founder were in front of the Senate later that day. Amora brushed her purple dress as a way to calm her nerves. The eyes of the Senators didn't help this attempt. She gave them an awkward smile.

"In case you are wondering why we called you here. NASA has brought it to our attention that many of their astronauts have gone missing," one of the Senators said. Amora rose her hand to ask for more explanation. "One has recently returned and mentioned something about Aperture. That was the only intelligible thing he said." The older man said the last sentence as if he had caught the Aperture workers in a lie.

"I object," Cave shouted stepping forward feet planted far apart. Caroline tapped him and he became silent with a grumble. The man's assistant rose her eyebrow to Amora indicate that she had to speak.

"Well," Amora began before clearing her throat. "My name's Amora Lovelock. I've worked for Aperture for quite a while. The only astronaut I have seen is my friend, Neil." Amora chuckled slightly. "And if you have seen him lately, Aperture and space is the only thing you can understand." Amora was chuckling, but the look on the Senators' faces made the laughing stop. "I have been in all the labs of Aperture and what you are accusing us of is laughable."

"Ms. Amora, how long have you been working for Mr. Johnson?" a senator asked.

Amora tried to calculate the amount of time that has past, "About half a year, more or less." She briefly wondered what this line of questioning was going at.

"And she has done a great job of forwarding science," Cave said. "One of the best employees I have except for my lovely assistant, Caroline." Amora looked at her boss feeling immense pride at being recognized.

"Ms. Lovelock, you said you've seen all the labs?" Amora answered affirmative. "And you haven't seen any evidence of human testing?" Amora was about to answer yes swiftly, but remembered what Cici had said about human testing. Craig also said something about the downstairs labs having the human testing. She knew that if she brought these comments to light, it would be misinterpreted. It was impossible to conceive that Aperture was doing anything morally questionable. "I… yes, that's true," Amora said against her judgement.

The three Aperture workers left the Senate silent. "Sir, they didn't seem to believe me," Amora said breaking the silence.

"Don't worry about it; they don't have any evidence," Cave said his pride and charisma not affected by the tense situation. "What's the worst they can do? Stop buying our turrets. Ha. Not a chance. They will turn to us for all their science needs. Don't you agree, Caroline?"

"Yes Sir, Mr. Johnson," Caroline said.

Amora nodded that she understood but was still unsure.

….

Amora ran into the office building. She was so late. "I was wondering when you would show up," Caroline's voice said. Amora stopped in her tracks and turned to the other woman who was sitting where Ashley, the secretary would normally sit.

"Sorry about that Caroline. I slept in a little," Amora said sheepishly. "What happened to Ashley?" she asked curious.

Caroline frowned, "Unfortunately because of the Senate hearing last week. We lost a lot of investors and we had to consider the future of Aperture." Amora responded with a simple 'oh' and wondered who else was laid off. "Speaking of the future of Aperture, Mr. Johnson wants to meet with his 'core' staff at eleven."

"Thank you, Caroline," Amora said before heading back to the offices. She would have like to go look for her friends to see if they made the cut, but she also knew she had a lot of work to do. For one, she needed to convince investors to give money to Aperture and not to other companies like Black Mesa.

She spent most of the morning trying to be charming and playing on the strengths of Aperture with moderate success. She looked up to the clock and saw that it was time to meet up with the rest of the senior staff in the conference hall.

The conference table was still empty so Amora picked a seat. The door opened and Cici and Dr. Rattmann entered. Cici sat next to Amora and Rattmann sat beside her. Curra came bouncing in followed by Andre. Craig came moments later. Rick tumbled in from a vent in the corner. Caroline and Cave were the last to appear and took the remaining seats at the table.

"Good Morning everyone. I will like to begin by saying that you are doing a wonderful job. That's why I called you here. For one reason or another, you have put a happy face in the notebook of science and therefore have my respect. As you may have heard or seen, the Senate hearing was unsuccessful and those uneducated…"

"Sir," Caroline stated to keep Cave on track.

"Right, the important thing is that we rethink about how we fund Aperture. I'm thinking we can sell the turrets as a home security system," Cave suggested.

"That's a brilliant plan. People always want a way to protect their things," Rick said.

"But we have to make sure that the turrets don't shoot at everything," Amora said. "They could endanger the family."

"That does sound reasonable. So those working in the robotics lab start programing the turrets with facial recognition," Cave ordered. "I think this is meeting has been very productive. So go forth and make some science." Amora stayed behind as the others left to speak with her boss.

"Mr. Johnson. I would like to apologize once again for my failure during the Senate hearing," Amora said looking down at her feet. "I've been thinking maybe we should reach out to younger children. If we can win their hearts, the hearts of the parents follow soon. We could have some of the employees go to nearby schools or even have a bring-your-child-to-work day."

"Sounds good, but I want you first to start advertise the new turret security service and search for more investors," Mr. Johnson said, "And don't worry about the Senate. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade."


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Hi everyone, I'm back. Thank you Zane-Ice-Fairy for following and favoriting this fic. Thank Revlry92 for also favoriting this story. To all of you who have favorited and followed this story, you are all the best.

-Portalfan4351 Returns- Thank you so much. I have looked at the other stories. Couldn't draw much inspiration so hopefully the interaction between Morality and Wheatley would be believable.

-Guest-I will definitely add that quote. How could I not. Of course I have to wait at least a couple of chapters.

-To all my readers- If you have any suggestions, I am more than willing to listen to them. I would of course credit you.

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Amora plastered on her smile as she walked to the small podium Caroline had set up in front of the Aperture office building. She looked behind her quickly to see Mr. Johnson give her a thumbs up. She wondered if the man honestly thought that the gesture would help. She sighed but put on her smile back on. She looked out to the crowd of cameras and microphones. The icons of national and local news stations were plastered over the cameras and microphones.

"Hello everyone, my name's Amora Lovelock. I'm the public relations manager for Aperture Science," Amora introduced herself , "I'm here to answer any questions that you have about Aperture."

A reporter in the front rose his hand. "Yes, sir?" Amora asked.

"In recent news, the Senate held a hearing about missing astronauts and Aperture was the center of these talks. Do you have anything to say about it?" the man asked.

Amora nodded, "Aperture seeks the expertise of many different people. As you may have heard, one of my friends and co-workers has gone to the moon to gather moon rocks. He needed a lot of guidance. While the disappearance of these men is sad, Aperture has only sought their experience and has nothing to do with their disappearance." Amora thought over her answer and decided that it sounded correct.

"Is there another question?" Amora asked and there was a sea of waving hands. Amora pointed to the female reporter who she believed raised her hand first.

"There is a large recall of Aperture's turret security system. Did Aperture know in the fault in their programing?"

Amora thought about the numerous complaints from the families of those who were killed by the turrets. "My co-workers are great scientists and programmers. I watched as they tested the turrets' recognition programs on themselves. They put their own lives on the line and found that there was no danger in the turrets. The loss of life is tragic and Aperture is doing its best to compensate those who were harmed."

"So were the deaths of the hundreds of people who bought the turrets just accidents?"

Amora knew she would had to tread carefully with this question. "The proper use of the turret system were given with the product. We recommended that the instructions were read fully before the package was opened." Amora looked over the crowd and she saw the looks of distrust and suspicion. "Next question." She tried to move on.

She pointed to a random reporter. "I have a question about the repulsion gel. This product has just begun to be sold as a pudding substitute and there have been many complaints about excessive vomiting and dehydration."

Amora nodded, "While repulsion gel is very sweet, it is recommended to eat no more than a spoonful."

"People are in the hospital because of Aperture," the reporter said, "You expect us not to suspect anything when you won't let anyone else into the facility."

Amora shifted uncomfortably. She had no idea what to say to shine light on Aperture. She tried to smile even when the reporters were badgering her for a response. "Aperture is willing to offer a tour to the media at a future date. I'll guide you through Aperture. Thank you. I have science to do." Amora left quickly giving Mr. Johnson an awkward smile, trying not to cry. As she passed him, he put his hand on her shoulder. She stopped and looked up at him.

She wanted to apologize to him for failing to pull Aperture from the negative light. "I'll deal with these people, Amora. You're a very good person," Mr. Johnson said. She smiled at his praise but didn't feel like she deserved it.

Amora nodded her thanks and continued to her office. She passed by the empty secretary desk. She tried not to think about the number of her coworkers that would be laid off because of her failure. Amora closed her office door and hid behind her desk. She pulled her knees to her chest as she sat on the floor. She hid her face in her arms. Amora tried to control her breathing to stop herself from sobbing.

The door to her office opened and Amora held her breathe hoping that whoever it was would leave. "Amora, I'm just going to take a piece of chocolate and I'll be gone," Wheatley's voice said. "Oh, you're not here. Well, I'll just tell you when I see you." Amora could feel a small smile tug at her lips at the fact that the man was talking to himself. Footsteps came closer and Amora became still. "Amora, what are you doing behind your desk? Was there an earthquake?" Amora didn't turn to face him but shook her head no. She could feel the man sit beside her. "Are you feeling well, luv? Do you need me to get Curra," the man paused to gasp, "You're not having an allergy attack are you? Where's your epipen, I can fix this."

"I'm fine Wheatley. Thank you," Amora mumbled. Wheatley didn't move. He remained sitting beside her eating his chocolate. "Wheatley, I'm sorry."

"What for, Amora," Wheatley asked. "I understand why you can't have peanut butter cups and I don't mind."

Amora sighed lifting her head. "That's not what I meant. I mean. I'm sorry. Aperture won't be able to survive this." She could feel tears build up.

"Amora, that's not your fault, luv." Wheatley said. "You're not a scientist. You're the pretty face of Aperture. Not to say that your only good quality is your face. You're smart, funny, nice, and…I'll just restart. You didn't have anything to do with the turrets or the gel." Amora stared at him for a moment feeling her face warming at his compliment. She wondered if he could hear her heart beating against her ribcage. "Are you running a fever, Amora?" Wheatley asked concerned placing his hand on her forehead, "You're red and your face is warm. Let's go see Curra." Amora shook her head.

"I'm fine. I'll just sit right here. Thank you, Wheatley," Amora said. She gathered her courage and leaned her head on his shoulder. Wheatley placed his arm around her shoulder.

"Are you sure you are okay? You aren't passing out on my shoulder are you?" he asked concerned. Amora giggled but didn't comment. "You don't have to tough this out. I'm sure Neil would understand why you couldn't come to his coming home party."

"Don't worry I feel a lot better now, thank you," she answered.

….

Amora was helping Curra set up the decorations. The nurse decided to kill two birds with one stone by holding the annual Christmas party at the same time as Neil's return party. Amora had just put a star on the tree when she turned to Curra. The woman held a sprig of mistletoe. "Look, Amora. I'm going to help you get your man," she said mischievously.

"I don't need your help Curra," Amora said grabbing streamers from the box. The nurse had been bugging her about her crush, but Amora refused to break to her interrogations.

"Riiiight, Cici needs the help though," Curra said chuckling as Amora agreed with her. The nurse attached the mistletoe onto the doorframe. The woman turned to face the entire room and clasped her hands, "Everything looks perfect. I can't wait. Mr. Johnson is picking up Neil and everyone else should be here soon. Can you pull out the food from the cafeteria?"

"I'll be right back," Amora said hurrying to the cafeteria. She pulled out the vegetable trays and balanced them carefully. She was setting the trays on the table when she heard people shuffling into the lobby.

Amora walked to the chairs lined along the room as she watched Rick and Craig walk in. Cici waved at her as she came in. The woman sat beside Amora. "Hi, how are you doing?" Cici asked.

Amora shrugged, "Okay, I guess."

"Don't worry about the press conference. Aperture will continue through this. It has suffered worse," Cici said optimistically.

"I just feel like I'm missing something," Amora admitted, "I should know what is going on, but the more I think about it, the more I realize I really don't know anything."

Cici frowned as if she was thinking, "Amora, Aperture is a complex place. To understand it completely, you'll have to be here for years."

Amora sighed, but nodded. "How's your cube coming along?"

Cici seemed to brighten at the question, "I'm going to go in it next week."

"Wait," Amora nearly shouted straightening her spine, "You're going to put yourself in the cube?"Cici nodded. "Why?" Amora asked.

Cici made an odd face. "I actually haven't told anyone. But..Amora. I don't know how to say this, but I've been seeing a doctor." She took a deep breath. "He diagnose me with leukemia. I have less than twenty percent chance of surviving."

Amora didn't know how to react. "Cici, I would say that I'm sorry but I know that doesn't change anything."

The woman shook her head, "That's why I need to go into the cube. I could go into suspended animation until a cure can be found." Amora hugged the other woman.

"Don't worry, Cici. I'll make sure someone will wake you up," Amora said, "I promise. Maybe it'll be Dr. Rattmann." The blonde woman blushed.

"Amora, I need you over here," Curra called from the door. Amora said goodbye to the woman after telling her to keep her chin up.

Amora neared Curra before she asked what the other woman needed. "Amora, stay right here," Curra demanded. Amora nodded and stood at the spot that Curra pointed at as the nurse left her. Amora sighed but remained in her position.

"So you're staking this place too," Rick's voice said from the other side of the door.

"I don't understand what you're talking about," Amora said peaking around the corner. Rick was leaning against the hallway. He calmly pointed above her head. Amora looked up to see that she was under the mistletoe. "Curra," Amora growled not amused and was even less amused when Rick chuckled.

Amora could hear a familiar English accent echoing down the hall. She thought to herself that maybe staying here for a moment longer could be a good idea. Amora turned so she didn't look like she was waiting for Wheatley to come down the hall. She turned right into Neil who was looking shocked. Amora opened her mouth and closed it.

"Space," Neil squeaked. Amora looked around to see if anyone saw her predicament. Curra was standing behind Neil giving Amora a thumbs up and a nod. She could hear Rick chuckling. Amora gave Neil a smile. "Hi, how are you doing?" Neil asked seeming very uncomfortable.

"Okay, how about you?" Amora answered.

"Seriously, just get on with it," Curra said. Amora took a deep breath and pressed her lips to Neil. He stiffened against her and she separated herself from him.

The red-haired man looked confused. Amora bobbed her head and hurried back to Cici who was still sitting. Amora tried to act nonchalant, but she could feel her face turning red. "Why aren't you screaming with excitement?" Curra asked causing Amora to look up. "Don't tell me, I got the wrong guy," Curra said shaking her head. Amora didn't say anything but sighed. "I'm so sorry. I..wow.."

"Don't worry about it, Curra," Amora said, "It doesn't mean anything. I forgive you, just don't do it again."

"To change subjects, have you two seen how many moon rocks Neil brought back?" Cici asked. "I'm surprised he landed the ship." Amora chuckled thinking about how enthusiastic the astronaut was and no doubt brought as many rocks as he could carry.

"What is Mr. Johnson going to do with them?" Amora asked.

Cici shrugged while Curra spoke up, "I think he is going to make some sort of anti-aging cream." Amora nodded the idea seemed safe enough. What could simple rocks do to the human body. Amora decided nothing dangerous.


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: I'm so sorry. I've had this ready for a while but couldn't find the time to post it. I'm really sorry. Thank you popjin and for following this fic.

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Amora crinkled her nose as she walked into her office. She would never understand why Mr. Johnson insisted in putting these pure white panels into every office. They smelt like really strong paint. The woman decided that it would be better for her health if she stayed out of the room for a couple of more days. She shrugged feeling glad that she had asked for the rest of the week off to visit her family for the holidays. Amora waited outside of her office for the reporters to come. She had received two calls yesterday from two stations asking for a tour of the facility. Amora took a deep breath and planned out the tour. This was one step toward rebuilding Aperture's reputation and soon Aperture would be back on top. She smirked slightly at the image of Black Mesa falling back into its place.

"Howdy, Mora," Rick's voice called out. He looked a little worse for wear as if he was running.

"Good morning, Rick. You look out of breath," Amora said concerned, "Do you need to sit down?"

Rick shook his head looking offended, "I'm an adventurer. I don't need a lady rest. I do need some lady advice though. You're a woman, Amora, so could you help me?"

Amora wondered briefly what he needed, "How can I help you?"

"It's Caroline. I have tried everything to get her attention, but all she does is ignore me," Rick said sounding frustrated.

"Have you tried being her friend and not listing off pick-up lines?" Amora asked knowing the answer. Rick had the decency to look slightly embarrassed. "Woman like men to enjoy their company, they like men to acknowledge what they have to say, and most of all they want to be seen as a person and not some trophy."

Rick looked down at his feet. "You sure that will work?"

Amora nodded, "Yes, but if she isn't romantically interested in you, you have to move on. There's plenty of fish in the sea. And I'm sure you'll have plenty that would love to be caught."

"Thanks, Mora. Be careful," Rick said ruffling her hair before he left her alone in the hall.

Amora straightened her hair huffing in false annoyance. She leaned on the wall of the hallway and continued to wait. There were a couple of unfamiliar voices from the lobby. Amora deciding that the voices must belong to the reporters.

Amora jogged slightly to see a man and woman signing in with Caroline. "Good morning, Caroline," Amora greeted. She turned to the reporters, "Hello, my name's Amora. I'm the public relations manager. I'll be giving you a tour of Aperture."

The man stepped forward and gave a wide a smile, "My name's Rowley Scott Stephens. I'm the head anchor of Worldnews." Amora shook his hand and was relieved when he released his crushing grip on her hand.

The female reporter not wanting to be overshadowed stepped forward to shake Amora's hand. "My name's Brianna Stacks. I'm sure you've seen me on the evening news."

Amora smiled, "I have seen both of your works. I'm very impressed with your dedication to reporting truths." Amora gave a grateful nod to Caroline who was starting to walk to Mr. Johnson's office. "If you would follow me, I'll take you through the labs."

Amora walked into the Polymer lab first followed by her two tails. "Andre, are you here?" She called out. Amora turned to the reporters, "Andre is the head of the Polymer lab. He's a brilliant man." The woman caught one of the scientists, Greg, was his name if she remembered correctly. "Greg, is Andre here?" Amora asked.

The man shook his head negative. "He's working in another lab for the next couple of weeks. I can show you what we are working on now." Amora thanked the man and allowed the scientist talk about how the lab was researching something called an emancipation grid. The intention of the grid was to reduce the waste that the facility produces and may even work as a way to reduce polymer waste in landfills. The reporters dutifully wrote down whatever Greg told them. Amora thanked the man for his time and continued her tour.

The next stop in the tour was the genetics lab. Amora led the reporters into the lab to see Craig bent over a microscope. "Good morning, Greg," Amora called out causing the man to jump slightly.

He straightened his glasses and his eyes ran over the trio. "Salutations. How may I be of assistance?" he asked cautiously.

"I was hoping you could show us some of the things you are working on," Amora asked looking expectantly at the man. She had warned all of the lab heads that the reporters were coming today so they would be prepared.

"Of course, currently the focus of Aperture's genetics lab has been to join the effort in the genome project. We're making large strides to map out the genome. After this project, we'll be working on brain mapping. If you don't mind, I have to return to work."

While Craig wasn't the most willing of employees, his insight was being noted at a furious pace. "The last lab I'll be showing you is the robotics lab. I suggest that you remain close to the walls. The scientists that work in the lab are often very busy and don't really look where they're going." Amora chuckled as she thought about the several times Wheatley almost bumped into her.

The reporters followed her footsteps as scientists hurried to and fro carrying various electronic bits. Amora saw Wheatley's blonde mop of hair and called out, "Wheatley." The blonde man fumbled with his equipment but caught it.

"Miss Amora, uh, good morning. Or is it afternoon. 'Ello. It's lovely today," Wheatley seemed to be more nervous today than normal and was starting to ramble more than usual. "I mean if you like the snow. I love the snow. You could build snowmen, snow forts, and snow angels. Oh, sorry. I started to ramble didn't I?" Amora nodded holding her chuckles.

" If you are looking for Neil, he is over there looking at the moon rocks he brought back. They're very interesting. Very…rocky and gray. I should be getting back to the work," Wheatley ended lamely before hurrying away. Amora watched him leave confused on his nervousness.

….

Amora allowed the reporters to leave before heading to the cafeteria to eat her lunch. She sat with her pasta dish, picking at the rhubarb that were strewn about. Someone sat down in front of her. Amora looked up from her meal to see Neil. "Hi Neil," she stated before turning her attention to the strip of rhubarb that refused to be separated from the linguine pasta.

"Amora, I wanted to talk about what happened last night," Neil started looking down at his own plate when Amora looked up at him. She wondered what he talking about before the party from the night before flashed through her mind.

"Oh, don't worry about that," Amora laughed slightly, "I got a little caught up with the party atmosphere." She chuckled again.

"That's what I thought," Neil said with a nod. If Amora didn't know the astronaut better, she would have thought he was disappointed or perhaps he was relieved.

"May we sit here?" Paisley's voice asked. Amora looked up to see Wheatley and Paisley standing waiting for her or Neil to respond. Amora shrugged while Neil answered that they could sit with them. Wheatley refused to look at her in the eyes. "So how are you two enjoying the meal? Amora, you haven't touched any of the rhubarb," Paisley said her voice both disbelieving and offended.

"I had a big breakfast, so I'm having a hard time finishing this delicious pasta dish," Amora lied. "So are you all excited for the holidays? I'm visiting my family later this week." Amora hoped the topic change would stop the chef from biting her head off.

"My family is having a reunion later this week, so I'll be visiting them," Neil stated. "They'll be so excited to hear about my space trip. I'll tell them about the moon, stars, the milky way, nebulas, and the rocket." Amora had a mental image of a crowd of Neils rambling about space; the picture was funny but she tried not to giggle.

"I'll be heading back to my old culinary school and giving a lecture," Paisley said, "I will see my family briefly on the way back to Aperture."

"How about you, Wheatley?" Amora asked.

"Me?" Wheatley asked, "I'll be staying here. Furthering science. Yup, lots of science to do. Experiments to run. And tests to be done." Amora frowned slightly thinking about how the man would be spending the holidays alone. "No time to go back home when we have so much work to do."

…..

After lunch, Amora headed to Cave's office to speak to him about the local middle school's career day and how Aperture should send a representative. She knocked on the door, "Mr. Johnson."

"Come in, Amora," Mr. Johnson's booming voice called out and Amora opened the door slowly. Mr. Johnson was signing paperwork, but looked up when she entered. "Amora, look at this cream I made from the moon rocks Neil collected," the man said excitedly holding up a small jar full of shimmering gray cream.

"So, what is this cream for?" Amora asked hoping that the suspicious material wasn't for human consumption.

"For skin care, of course. Does the moon have wrinkles? No it doesn't. Therefore, moonrocks equals young looking skin," Mr. Johnson said with absolute confidence.

"I don't think that's how it works, Sir," Amora said shaking her head unconvinced. "Don't put any of that stuff on you, sir. At least until you have some animal trials. Anyways, I came to say that I think that the career day next month for the middle school would be a good opportunity to gain awareness."

"That sounds plausible, but don't take away too many of my scientists. I need them for science," Mr. Johnson said, "In fact take the intern."

"I was thinking the exact same thing, sir. Wheatley is closer to the children's ages so will be able to relate to them," Amora said quickly.

"Sounds good. You're dismissed," Mr. Johnson said looking back at the jar of cream in his hands.

Amora was going to tell him not to use the cream again, but decided that the man would know better. She exited the office and started to hunt for Wheatley to tell him the news.

She found him rather quickly. He was bent over some papers. "Wheatley, I have a little assignment for you," she said loudly. The intern moved the papers on his desk frantically.

"Um..Hi.. Just doing paperwork. Yup, a whole lot of paperwork," Wheatley said unsure, "A literal forest of paperwork."

"Okay," Amora responded confused. "I was just going to tell you that you've been chosen to represent Aperture during the middle school's next career day."

The man blinked his blue eyes like he didn't believe what he heard. "That's a big honor. I promise I won't mess this up. Those children will be dying to work here. Yup, little future Aperture scientists. Wait, what will I talk about. Children can't understand science. Or at least the science that we're studying." Amora figuring that he would continue a little longer leaned against the lab table to get comfortable. The man stopped speaking immediately and swallowed nervously. "Is that all you have to say? Not that I want you to leave. I like talking with you. It's just that we both are working and talking can be distracting. I'm sure you can talk and work at the same time. You're clever like that. But I can't work while you're watching."

Amora chuckled," I'll leave, but I wanted to say that maybe you should at least call up your family. I'm sure they miss you." Amora looked down at Wheatley's table embarrassed and noticed what looked like a calendar. "The calendar came out already? I thought it would have taken another week at least." Amora grabbed the calendar looking at the month that it was opened to. Wheatley made a motion to stop her motion. The word 'July' was clearly printed and the picture was of herself. Amora looked at the image in disbelief. She was positive that this picture was never to see the light of day. The picture her was posed in a red two-piece bathing suit.

The only thought that ran through her mind was that Curra better start running now. "I'll be back, " Amora said to a slightly pink Wheatley. With that she stormed out of the laboratory.


	11. Chapter 11

A/N: Hello everyone, I just would like to thank kuappafanit for the favorites and follows.

-kuappafanit- Thank you for the kind words. Hopefully I can continue to reach your expectations. As far as the answers to your questions, you're absolutely right. I won't answer and spoil the ending. Thank you for your review.

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It was amazing what a simple vacation can do to one's morale. Amora could almost sing when she reentered the facility. She smiled even when she saw the empty secretary desk and the empty lobby. She has been keeping track of Aperture's declining stocks. Black Mesa has been spreading nasty rumors about Aperture, but it didn't matter. With various community outreaches, Aperture was sure to be back on top.

"Amora, can you come to Mr. Johnson's office?" Caroline called out as Amora passed by quickly. The younger woman stopped immediately.

"Of course," Amora responded turning on her heel to follow the assistant to the CEO's office. The other woman was unusually quiet.

Before Caroline pulled the handle, she turned to Amora. "You must understand something before you go in. What you are about to see can't be spoken about. Not to Curra, not to Rick, to absolutely no one."

Amora noted how serious the woman sounded. It frightened her a little as if the older woman was asking her to hide something very important. "I promise. I won't tell another soul."

Caroline narrowed her eyes and looked into Amora's own as if trying to find some lie in her gaze or burn holes in her head. "Okay, come on in." Caroline opened the door slowly and only wide enough to allow Amora in. Amora stepped cautiously into the room. The door closed almost silently.

"Mr. Johnson, please don't do that," Caroline said frantic hurrying forward to the desk. Amora's attention was drawn to the man behind the desk. She was so used to seeing Cave Johnson smiling and laughing. What she saw now was a man silent as he poked at the lesions on his face. Amora gasped at the markings on the older man's face, knowing they must hurt.

"Mr. Johnson, what happened to you?" Amora gasped putting her hands over her mouth. "Are you okay?" She stepped forward in an effort to help.

"Do I look okay?" Mr. Johnson said a little gruffly. "There seems to be minor side effects to my antiwrinkle cream. Nothing that the boys in the lab can't fix."

"Okay, what did you need me to do?" Amora asked stepping closer to the CEO's desk and lightly putting her hands on it.

"We need you to keep this out of the media. Simply put, we need you to be the public face of Aperture at least until this blows over," Caroline stated quickly. "You won't be running the facility, but you'll be speaking to all the reporters and any other public officials."

Amora nodded her head understandingly. If this side effect became public knowledge, it would be another nail in Aperture's coffin. "Don't worry. There's no way anyone is going to find out. I hope you get better Mr. Johnson," Amora said reaching out to put a comforting hand on his. Amora was dismissed and she walked to her office slowly stopping by the water cooler quickly for a drink of water.

"Hey, Moron, you forgot this," a voice said snidely. Amora looked up from the water cooler to see Wheatley struggling with an armful of lab coats. A man shorter than the blonde tossed another lab coat onto Wheatley's head. "And once you dropped those off at the dry cleaners, you can get us our coffee," the other scientist continued. Amora narrowed her eyes as the man pushed her friend almost causing him to drop all of the clothing. She didn't hesitate for a moment crumbling her cup and dropping it to the ground. Amora stomped over to the two males pointing accusingly to the other scientist which must have looked amusing due to her small stature.

"Robert Burns, you have no right to speak to Wheatley like that," Amora nearly growled as she glared at him. The dirty blonde scientist looked almost amused as he looked down on her.

"You have to sic your girlfriend on me, moron?" Robert said with a chuckle looking down at the shorter woman. "I hate to break it to you, but I'm not scared of Aperture's bimbo."

"Don't you think that's crossing the line a little? Amora is brilliant and kind and considerate," Wheatley started.

"Robert," Amora interrupted Wheatley. "You were working on the repulsion gel project were you not? I would hate for the public to know that you were behind that fiasco. You might even be prosecuted if you have knowledge of the possible side effects. I'm sure Cave would fire you on the spot," Amora stated hoping she came off as threatening. Robert narrowed his eyes. "I would apologize now if I was you and for good measure you can take care of these," Amora said smugly taking the lab coats from Wheatley and dropping them into the arms of the other scientist.

Robert turned his gaze from one to the other, "I apologize for my actions." With another grumble the scientist took away the lab coats. Amora took a couple of deep breaths trying to calm herself.

"Thank you, Amora. You didn't have to do that. I could have taken care of the lab coats and the coffee. It's not difficult and I'll still be able to continue my work and finished it too."

"Do they always call you a moron?" Amora asked barely hearing Wheatley.

"Yes. I don't like it and I remind them I'm not a moron, but they don't listen."

"Don't believe what they say," Amora turned to finally face the man. She looked into his blue eyes, "In my opinion, you're not a moron. You may be impulsive and an optimist, but you're not a moron." Amora sighed.

"That's very nice to say Amora. Um, sorry about him calling you my girlfriend. I know girls don't like when people do that. Paisley always gets upset when people assume we're dating. I guess us being second cousins doesn't help, but maybe it's just a girl thing. But it could have been offensive to you because I know that you and Neil are pretty serious and it wouldn't be good to have rumors spread."

Amora almost cheered at his little spiel, but she barely managed to control her urge to dance. "Neil and I are just friends, Wheatley," Amora said as Wheatley paused in his talk.

"Oh, that's good news. I mean, uh, I wasn't supposed to say that. Lovely weather we're having today. Nice and snowy. Perfect for a snowball fight," Wheatley stuttered.

Amora took a deep breath, "Wheatley?" She hadn't meant his name to be a question, but he probably didn't hear it because he said her name at the same time. "Sorry you go first."

The taller man ruffled his hair. "Um. I don't know how to ask, but if you aren't busy tonight, would you like to go to dinner and maybe a movie. You don't have to go if you don't want to and I won't feel offended if you say no. It would just be nice to spend time with you. Just you and me. That sounded a little creepy. I mean, um," he paused slightly.

"I would love to," Amora said taking advantage of his pause to speak.

"Wait, what. A-are you serious?" Wheatley asked, looking confused and shocked at her response.

"Positive," Amora said, "You want to meet after the facility closes?"

"Yes, that would be the best time. We will meet in front of the building and then go eat. And then watch a movie. I don't even know what is playing. Do you like seafood? I don't so I hope you don't want to eat some. You're not vegetarian are you. Oh, we can't go anywhere that there are peanuts. We wouldn't want another allergy attack," Wheatley rambled.

"Wheatley," Amora called quietly. Wheatley paused for a moment to hear her out. "We can figure this out tonight."

"Of course, we are both very busy and …okay I started to ramble again, "Wheatley said embarrassed. "I'll see you tonight." He hurried off leaving Amora. The woman pumped her fist when he entered the elevator. Dancing to the music in her head.

"You know if you keep doing that, people will think that you're crazy," Rick's voice said smugly. Amora spun around to face the man who was looking amused.

Amora crossed her arms and looked at her feet embarrassed. "You're the only one who sneaks up on me. How do you even do that?"

Rick laughed and ruffled her hair, "You see everything from the vents."

Amora looked at the man disbelieving. "I don't think they're supposed to support a person's weight." Rick shrugged at the comment.

"So you're going on a date with the intern?" Rick said raising an eyebrow at her.

"He's name is Wheatley," Amora said with a sigh.

"Should I scare him a bit? Make sure he doesn't get any ideas," Rick offered motioning to his whip.

"No, big brother," Amora said exasperated at the thought.

"Have to make sure my little sis is taken care of," Rick said once again ruffling her hair. Amora smiled glad that the man did treat her like a younger sister. "On a different note, Caroline and I are going to a science convention, alone. Just the two of us. You're advice worked."

Amora smiled sadly knowing that the reason why Rick was invited was because Cave wouldn't be able to. "I'm glad to hear that. Be careful."


	12. Chapter 12

A/N: Hello everyone, it's been a while. Anyways, thank you Zaconator and Zackis and the Misty Author for favoriting and following this fic.

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Amora couldn't even look at her reflection in the mirror. In the month since Cave asked her to become the public face of Aperture, she has been working nonstop. A charity here, a public appearance there, a meeting with investors and reports. The increase in work was evident on her face which looked exhausted. "Amora, are you okay?" Cici asked. Amora straightened from the bathroom sink and spun to face the woman.

"Yes, I'm fine. Just a little tired," Amora smiled trying to deflect another question. It was obvious she was tired; the bags under her eyes didn't lie.

"Liar," Curra said from her position by an Aperture Science poster. The nurse stepped closer scanning Amora. "You look like you're going to collapse. Have you been sleeping well? Have you been eating properly?"

"Yes, mom," Amora said annoyed at the barrage of questions, "I'm fine." Curra rose an eyebrow about to comment on Amora's obvious lie. "I'm serious. I'll be okay. This day isn't about me it's about CiCi. She's the one who's performing a monumental experiment."

Amora pointed to the other woman. Cici just shrugged, "It was the most logical choice to make. I'm going to die anyways might as well further science." The blonde woman straightened her lab coat. "How do I look? I don't want to look horrible when I wake up." Cici gave a quick humorless laugh. Curra joined in immediately, the nurse's laugh seemed to be real. Amora chuckled out of politeness, but she still hadn't really accepted that her friend was going into stasis and probably wouldn't wake in her lifetime. In Amora's opinion, it was like she was going to see her friend die. "You should make a time capsule for me so I can be caught up with everything," Cici suggested rearranging her hair again.

"Sure thing. I'll make sure all the guys are in on it as well," Curra answered quickly. "We could include pictures of all of us. It could be a lot of fun." Curra seemed to lose her interest in Amora which was a relief.

Cici looked at her watch, "We should be heading to the lab now and get started. Amora, can you make sure no one moves the cube. I would like it to stay in the lab." The blonde woman seemed to be forcing her smile.

"I can do that," Amora said as the women left the bathroom. She followed silently as Curra asked Cici what types of things she would like in this time capsule. The three of them walked into the lab. Amora looked over the group of coworkers which became like family to her. Rick and Craig were speaking to each other rather loudly. They were probably arguing, like they always did. Amora smiled at the bit of normalcy. She turned to see Neil working on something in his hand, oblivious to the world. Paisley and Wheatley were nearby speaking calmly. Amora directed herself to stand beside Wheatley; the man could always make her feel better even when he didn't try to.

"Hi Amora. Wow, you look horri- I mean you look beautiful. Yup, natural beauty... like you just woke up," Wheatley said proudly like he gave a compliment.

Amora narrowed her eyes at the man; she was unsure if she should be insulted or should just ignore Wheatley's lack of tack. Wheatley look at Paisley as if to ask why Amora was giving him a dirty look. Paisley shook her head in disbelief and gave a little scoff. Amora gave up the glare and chuckled. "Thanks, Wheatley. I'm just very tired."

"Well, maybe you should sleep that normally would help with the tired thing. I'm positive that you need to sleep. Of course, if you think you don't need to rest, I'm sure you're right. But I would suggest that you sleep. Perhaps not now because this is a big event and you won't be able to see Curra again. But definitely later today you need to rest," Wheatley rambled before he stopped abruptly as Amora wrapped an arm around his waist and pulled him close to her. Wheatley put his arm around her shoulder without a word much to Amora's relief.

"I guess everyone is here," Cici began with a small voice.

"Wait!" Curra shouted. "Where's Andre? He's not busy, is he? Have any of you seen him?" The woman looked around the small crowd not seeing her boyfriend.

"Calm down, little lady. Andre is working at another lab for a while so you won't be seeing him," Rick said in his confident manner. Curra looked a little sad and Amora could practically hear her thoughts. The nurse was wondering why her boyfriend had failed to tell her about the change.

"Uh, I guess I'll continue. I don't want to take long, but I just wanted to say that it has been a pleasure working with all of you. I hope to see all of you again… I guess this is bye," Cici said her voice breaking at the last word. The woman curled into the gray cube and nodded to Dr. Ratmann who lowered the open side shutting the woman in. The box made a loud sealing sound.

"You okay, luv? You're shaking like one of those little yippy dogs. You know the ones that always bark. Chihuahuas I think they're called. But anyways, you are shaking like them. Are you cold? If you are, then I can give you my lab coat. It's not that warm but it might help a little." Wheatley removed the lab coat and put it around Amora's shoulders. She could feel something heavy weighing down the coat and briefly wanted to remind Wheatley that he shouldn't carry Aperture equipment in his pocket. Even with the little warmth from the coat, Amora couldn't stop shivering. She couldn't believe that one of her best friends was gone just like that. She blinked away tears that threaten to fall.

Slowly the other scientist begun to file out of the lab. "Come on, luv. We can't stay in the lab all day. We are both are very busy and I wanted to show you something," Wheatley turned to leave and Amora followed not saying anything. She looked down at her feet still feeling very mournful that Cici was gone and it seemed like no one cared. "Amora, you should see what we're working on now. It's really neat. And the best part is that I helped build it. Yup, they told me to build it and I did. It wasn't difficult for a genius like me."

Amora chuckled finally snapping out of her reverie. "That sounds great. I'm sure its amazing whatever you made." She smiled at the man before taking his hand.

"Here we are, lab sweet lab," Wheatley chuckled a little. He released Amora's hand leaving it feeling very empty. "So be careful not to touch anything. It may explode…or it may not so don't worry about it too much. Just don't touch anything." Amora kept her hands to herself as the pair neared Wheatley's lab table. Scattered all around the surface were electronic bits and wires. In the center of the entire mess was a single sphere with an open front. "This one is isn't done yet. I wanted you to see this one," Wheatley said waving Amora to another lab table. This one was cleared except for another large sphere with two handles. As Amora got near it she heard a loud snarling sound. "See, isn't it amazing?" Wheatley asked turning it around so Amora was staring at a large red optic as it twitched around. The growling got louder and Amora took an unconfident step back. "Isn't it great?" Wheatley asked searching for approval.

"What is it?" Amora asked moving away from the angry machine's sight. The growling calmed a little.

Wheatley shrugged, "It's an artificial intelligence. Yup, a computer of sorts. You know what I mean by artificial intelligence."

"I do but what it is supposed to do? Be angry?" Amora asked. "It's kind of scary to tell you the truth."

"Oh," Wheatley slumped his shoulders, "That's my fault. Didn't make enough space for the entire AI that Craig and Neil worked on. Yup, just me being a moron."

"Hey, what did I tell you about you being a moron?" Amora said smacking Wheatley gently on the arm before putting her hands on her hips. "This was just a test, right? You'll have a chance to improve. Besides, this is the first I ever heard of a functioning AI. I'm sure in a couple of months you'll have an AI that's nearly human." Amora smiled before giving the man a hug.


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: Hi everyone, It's been a while. Thank You Dr. MeeM PhD. Mad Science and DanEO1 for following and/ or favoriting this fic.

-Dr. MeeM Ph.D Mad Science- Thank you for your kind words. I am doing my best to continue.

Oh and by the way, I'm interested in finding a cover for this fic. If any of you can draw or know of a picture of human Wheatley and Morality, that would be great.

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Amora retold Cave and Caroline what had been going on in the labs and the interviews that she had been to. "We seem to stop our popularity decline, there's isn't really any good news to say other than that. Black Mesa is still on the rise. And to top it all there is one reporter that is amazingly noisy. I've had to have Rick toss him out a couple of times," Amora said with a sigh. She looked up from her little spiral where she wrote all her notes.

Caroline frowned, "I can make sure he doesn't sniff around here anymore, Sir." The assistant looked to the man for permission. The way she said that made Amora wonder what the other woman had in mind.

"I'm going to rely on you for that, Caroline. And I think that Dave needs to take some tests. If you can think of anyone else that can use testing, go ahead and sign them up," Cave said his normally booming voice was crackling. Amora tried not to let her worry show; last time she had Cave yelled at her saying he didn't need her pity which led him to hacking cough. "I'm fine," the CEO said to his assistant as the woman handed him a water bottle.

"Did you need me to get your pain killer?" Amora asked leaning forward ready to retrieve said medication.

"I'm not an invalid. You know you I am? I'M CAVE..." the man's last name was lost in a coughing fit. Once the fit subsided, he glanced at Caroline, "Can you get me those pain killers?"

"Yes, Sir," Caroline answered in a heartbeat. She procured the pills from one of the filing cabinets. Cave swallowed them expertly.

The door to the office slammed into the wall causing all three to jump at the sudden noise. Amora turned in her seat to see who had entered. "Mr. Johnson, where's Andre?" Curra's voice called out before the woman's eyes noticed the CEO. The nurse stopped speaking, her mouth slightly open. Amora knew what the woman was thinking. The man sitting behind the desk was nothing like the proud Cave Johnson. The man behind the desk was a shell of a man. "Mr. Johnson?" Curra's voice became small. "What's wrong with you?"

Caroline had slipped behind the newcomer closing the office door behind the nurse. "Turns out moon rocks are pure poison. I'm deathly ill, " Cave said matter-of-factly.

"Andre was working with those moon rocks," Curra said in a small voice. "Where is he? Is he still in this facility?" She looked from Amora to Caroline and then to Cave. Without a word, Curra ran back out of the door.

"I'll get her, Mr. Johnson," Amora said before running after the nurse. Amora ran into the hall to see Curra at the elevator pressing the button madly. "Curra, come back and talk to me," Amora called out to the woman as the elevator doors opened. Curra looked at Amora with a betrayed look. Amora reached the elevator as the doors closed. Amora sighed and decided to take the stairs.

Amora climbed the final steps breathing heavily. Curra wasn't in sight. She frowned and went back to the stairwell to go to the next floor. Curra was nowhere to be found.

Amora stopped in the hallway of the robotics lab wondering where the woman had disappeared to. "You're ready to go to lunch already? It's a little early don't you think? Unless you like an early lunch. I normally eat lunch later so I won't be hungry later. With the cafeteria shut down, we'll have to go off the facility. Most people will still be serving breakfast. Do you like breakfast for lunch? I personally like eating breakfast for dinner sometimes. A good omelet does sound good. ," Wheatley started to ramble before Amora could even register that he had appeared.

"Oh, I'm just looking for Curra. Did she come in here?" Amora asked. The taller man shook his head.

"I haven't seen her all day. But since you're here maybe you can help me with something," Wheatley suggested pulling at her arm. Amora nodded and allowed Wheatley to guide her to the lab. Amora walked calmly keeping an eye on the red-eyed sphere that was growling in the corner. "So it's fairly simple. I'm moving out of my apartment to a larger house. Since I got a raise, I think it's high time that I got my own place. I just want a second opinion on some of the choices. I trust your opinion the most so I thought, why don't I have Amora look at some." Wheatley explained with a nervous chuckle. Amora knew that he was hiding something. He had his hands in the pockets of his lab coat which normally meant he was keeping something to himself. She didn't question it because most of the time the man would blurt out whatever he was hiding within a couple of moments.

Amora looked at each of the houses that Wheatley had pictures of. She stated what she liked of each and finally gave her favorite when pressed. "Is that all you needed me to see?" Amora asked.

"Actually, we finished another AI core if you want to see it. It's actually really interesting," Wheatley said motioning for Amora to follow him. Amora followed Wheatley until they had reached Neil's lab table. In the center of said table sat a sphere much like the one growling in the corner. This core had a blue optic that focused on the pair as if it could see them. Amora didn't doubt that the thing was examining them.

"Three slash four cup vegetable oil, four large eggs, one cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, three slash four cups butter or magarine," the core stated in an electronic voice.

"Is that a recipe?" Amora asked Wheatley.

"We think it's a cake recipe. A chocolate cake of course. I wouldn't know. I don't bake. I prefer pie instead of cake, but this AI is fascinated with cake. The scientists think that it's corrupted so they are running more tests," Wheatley said.

Amora nodded that she understood. "I think I'll listen to it. Maybe I can make this cake," she stated. Wheatley left her alone as he went back to his lab table looking over the pictures he had earlier. Amora listened to the core taking notes, but it wasn't long until she realized that the core was definitely malfunctioning.

"Fish shaped dirt, Fiberglass surface resins, two cups rhubarb, sliced," the core had continued its odd recipe.

"I think Paisley would like this core. It likes rhubarb almost as much as she does," Amora said with a laugh. She left the core alone deciding that any recipe the core relayed was flawed.

"I wonder how she's taking the whole cafeteria closing thing. I know she was looking at offers from Black Mesa. I don't think she wanted to go though with them. I hope not," Wheatley said looking up from his papers.

"Well, we can go the café down the street. I heard they have delicious Philly cheesesteaks," Amora suggested.

"That sounds great. Maybe we'll have time to stop for ice cream," Wheatley said excitedly. Amora smiled before giving the man a kiss on his cheek.

"I should be looking for Curra. I need to explain something," Amora said with a sigh wanting to spend the day here rather than her own office.

Amora spent the rest of the day looking for Curra with no luck.


	14. Chapter 14

A/N: Hi everyone. You know what they say absence makes the heart grow fonder...maybe. Anyways, Thank you Boombox-TFA for following and favoriting both this fic and me. You are awesome. Actually all of you are awesome. Unfortunately, this fic is reaching its end soon. :( Thank you all for reading this.

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Amora looked at Wheatley who gave her a crooked smile holding out the small poorly wrapped package. She smiled at him before throwing her arms around his shoulders. "I love it," she said quickly before the man could start to ramble about her birthday.

"But you don't know what it is," Wheatley said skeptically.

Amora shrugged, "But it came from you, so I love it." She smiled wider.

"You're a little strange. Not that it's bad. Actually, it makes buying gifts easier. Which can save me money," Wheatley started to say.

"That's good news because I definitely want dessert when we go to that restaurant tonight. I still can't believe you got reservations for it. Are you sure you want to go? It's very expensive and it's only my birthday, not a very important day," Amora said tilting her head.

"Absolutely. This is a very important day. It's so important that I can't tell you why it's important. Besides the fact that it's your birthday. I really want you to remember this birthday," Wheatley chuckled nervously.

Morality leaned forward slightly, "You're hiding something from me, aren't you?" She narrowed her eyes as Wheatley dropped the screwdriver in his hand.

"Y-Yo-You're distracting me. I can't finish this with you hovering over me," Wheatley stuttered as Amora leaned over the open core. "But what if something goes horribly wrong? I don't want to be punished for it. Especially since the boys downstairs think they are getting closer to getting it right."

"For your information, I think this looks good," Amora said looking over the tangle of wires. "What color is this one?"

Wheatley sighed, "It's a purple color. Kinda like your shirt, but you know it's a light. This core also has the largest memory of all of them."

"Here's the next one," Rick's voice echoed causing both to jump as the adventurer dropped another core on Wheatley's table. This one had a bright orange optic that flitted around the room.

"What is that? That thing has numbers on it," the core blathered to itself. Amora narrowed her eyes at the machine.

"Well, fourth time is the charm," Rick said before leaving the two.

Amora glared at the machine. There was something family about its voice and personality. "Wheatley, this might sound crazy, but doesn't this thing sound like Curra?" Amora asked pushing the sphere slightly.

Wheatley looked up from his project, "Now, that definitely crazy. Curra doesn't ask that many questions." Amora gave him an unbelieving look. "She asks a lot of questions. But she doesn't sound like a machine."

"How about Paisley, Andre? They went missing as well," Amora asked suddenly having an epiphany. Each time one of her coworkers disappeared another core replaced them. "What if we all disappear? Who's next? You, me, Rick?" Amora was really starting to panic shaking her head.

"What cake do you want for your birthday? I know you said you like a strawberry cake, but I just wanted to make sure that it what you want," Wheatley said suddenly. Amora paused in her rant and completely stopping her panic as she tried to figure out how the subject change came.

"Uh, yeah, strawberry sounds great," Amora said distracted. "Are we getting cake after dinner?" she asked.

"Well, I'm going to bake it. You know with the recipe that the core suggested. It sounds like it would be great like what Paisley would make. Something that sounds like it would taste horrible and actually comes out great. I learned a while ago not to ask what went into anything because then I wouldn't want to eat it." Wheatley rambled leaving Amora distracted.

"We can always just buy a cake," Amora suggested not wanting to have whatever weird concoction that Wheatley would come up with.

"It's no problem. I want to bake you a cake," Wheatley said, "I also dropped the cake I ordered when I took it home."

Amora laughed at the way Wheatley tried to cover up his mishap with sentiment. She still wasn't eating that cake though. The door to the lab slammed open and Amora turned to see who came in. At the sight of gravity defying black hair, Amora recognized Dr. Rattmann. The older scientist looked visibly distressed. His hands were shaking as he hurried into the lab. Dr. Rattmann then proceeded to look over every table and all the cabinets.

"Can I help you find something?" Amora asked concerned that the man hadn't said a single word to them. Dr. Rattmann's gray eyes looked up at her though they didn't seem to focus on her.

"No, no. It's all right. But you can't be here," Rattmann stated.

"Don't worry, I'm not touching anything," Amora stated trying to calm the man and direct him away from the room. It wasn't any secret that the man suffered from schizophrenia and the woman figured that he needed his medication.

"No, I meant you shouldn't be here in Aperture. It's too dangerous," Dr. Rattmann insisted in a lowered voice. Amora looked over her shoulder only seeing Wheatley, she wondered why the scientist was being so secretive.

"What are you trying to tell me?" Amora asked tightening her hold on his shoulder.

"CiCi told me that you were going to be in danger," Rattmann continued with certainty.

"Cici is out of her cube?" Amora asked excited.

"No, she told me while she was in the cube," Rattmann answered. "Here, just use this and see for yourself." The man pushed a key card into her grasp. "Not now though. You have to go after everyone is gone."

"Doug," Amora said softly not wanting to upset him, but also trying to get his attention, "Cici is in stasis there's no way she could have told you this." The man didn't react to her words, but seemed satisfied that Amora had the key card.

"I believe in you," Dr. Rattmann said with certainty before leaving Amora more confused. Amora sighed and decided that she would return the card once the older man came to his senses.

~Portal~

Amora looked back at the card laying on her desk. Part of her was curious on what it would lead to while another part of her told her that it probably leads to more science things that she didn't know about. She pushed herself away from her desk and paced. What harm could come if she did go there. If she couldn't understand that was fine. And why would she be worried about getting caught? She should have access to everything in Aperture. Amora looked at her clock. It read 6:30 and she knew that most of the employees would have left by now. They were really punctual like that. Amora picked up the card determined to at least be able to tell Dr. Rattmann that she listened to him. She walked to the elevator and entered. She knew that there had to be something to slide the card into. Seeing a small black box, Amora tried to slide the card along each side of the box. Not getting a response, she was about to give up when she had an idea to tap the box with the card. The black box lit up and the mechanisms in the elevator seemed to start up.


	15. Chapter 15

A/N: Hi everyone, I hope you enjoy this chapter.

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Amora felt the elevator shift beneath her feet and start to descend. This caused her to momentarily to panic; she was in the lobby and there wasn't any floor lower than that. She held onto the brass railing that lined the elevator. She put the key card into her pocket while all the rumors the reporters have been saying ran through her head. But they couldn't be real. No one in their right mind would fuse human DNA with praying mantis DNA. Mr. Johnson wouldn't do something so immoral as testing on people without consent.

Amora nodded to herself. There was absolutely no way anything really horrible could be down here. She was getting herself worked up over nothing. The doors to the elevator opened and Amora stepped out.

The floor was very different than those above ground. It was cold and sterile. White tiles were on the walls and floors. Amora walked slowly onto the white tiles, her heels clicked softly. She looked to her left and then to her right as though she was doing something wrong. She chuckled to herself, "I'm becoming as paranoid as Dr. Rattmann." She picked a direction and walked slowly. The hallway was well-lit and empty. Amora passed a window and she looked in.

A woman in an orange jumpsuit carrying a strange backpack contraption was running. Amora leaned forward to watch now curious. The woman in the jumpsuit stopped her running and spun around looking for something. She paused when she noticed her observer. Amora could tell that the woman was angrily shouting at her. She frowned curious why the other woman was so mad at her for.

The sound of gunshots rumbled in the room. Amora stared wide-eyed as a turret was dropped and promptly started shooting. She gasped and put a hand to her mouth feeling sick at the sight of the blood that now splattered the pure white tiles.

Amora spun around determined to get out of there and inform the authorities. The sounds of footsteps leaving the elevator sent a chill of fear through her. Amora ran away from the footsteps and turned down another hallway. She hurried down the hallway as fast as she could.

She passed another window but wasn't prepared to look through it. Amora stopped her running after she was certain that she wasn't being followed. She walked slowly as she realized that in her rush to get away she had gotten herself lost.

Amora sighed as she tried to figure out how to get back to the lift. She passed a window and paused to look in it. A man with an orange jumpsuit was on a platform near the ceiling when he slipped. Amora turned away before the man hit the floor not wanting to see what surely would have been a mess.

She backed away from the window. She looked down at her feet realizing that these people were dying because of her. If she was smart enough to wonder about all the rumors she heard, she could have stopped this. There was even a Senate hearing and she didn't think anything suspicious about it. She mentally berated herself until a loud alarm brought her hands to her ears. A red light flashed and Amora wondered if someone found her.

She turned around looking for a place to hide. Shadows at the end of the hall blocked some of the red light. Amora stepped back not recognizing the shapes the shadows created. She took another step back as the shadows grew larger.

The most horrendous beings came into view. Amora only caught a quick glance before she turned on her heel and ran as if her life depended on it. The strange creatures were taller than her with what looked like mandibles on their faces and their arms twisted into a mock semblance of a prayer. Amora could hear the creatures behind her starting to catch up. She heard a crack and fell forward crashing into the ground. She looked at her broken heel that decided to betray her before looking up at the mantis men that approached her. Amora scooted backwards trying to get as far away from their mandibles as possible.

She turned away from them, just seeing them terrified her. Her thoughts turned to Wheatley and how he was waiting for her. How he had planned this dinner only for her to mess it up by coming down here. She closed her eyes and waited for the strange experiments to tear her apart. Pain never came, but the sound of gunshots rang through her ears.

Amora opened her eyes fearfully. The strange creatures were crumbled on the ground; their dead eyes stared directly at her. "Now, that's what I call an entrance," Rick's rowdy voice said. Amora didn't think she could ever be as happy to hear his voice than right at this moment. She looked up to see Rick striding over. "What are you doing here, Amora?" Rick asked his tone was angry.

"I was on the elevator and it came down here," Amora said quickly; it wasn't a lie, but wasn't exactly true.

Rick frowned, "I'll help you get to where you need to be." The man reached down and pulled Amora to her feet.

"Thank you for saving me from those things," Amora said reaching down and taking off her broken heels.

"Don't mention it," Rick said before placing a hand on her arm. "Follow me." The woman followed as the man guided her through the halls.

He led her to a door and Amora knew that something was wrong; she didn't go through any doors in her mad dash. "Rick, where are we going?" she asked trying to release herself from his grip. The man didn't answer but the doors slid open.

"Rick, where have you been?" Craig's voice asked before Amora caught sight of him. The man looked at her before also frowning at her. "Amora," he said.

"What's going on?" Amora asked now feeling really frightened that neither man said anything to her. They were silent as she was pulled to a metal bed.

"Get on," Rick said pointing his chin toward the metal bed.

"No," Amora said as she wrestled with his grip on her arm. "I don't know what's going on," she shouted now thoroughly terrified.

"It's a simple test, Amora," Cave's voice said as the doors slid open again. "We've been so distracted with conversion gel and portal devices that we were ignoring the true future of science."

"Which is what?" Amora asked as she continued to struggle with Rick.

"A genetic lifeform and disk operating system. Uploading a person's memory and personality into a computer," Cave said. "We've been running test after test and have been less than successful." Amora narrowed her eyes as the pieces came together. Her missing friends, the personality cores. If only it wasn't too late.

Rick fed up with her struggling picked her up and placed her on the cold metal bed. He strapped her in. "You can't do this to me," Amora shouted.

"But it's for science, Amora," Cave said before turning to leave. "You boys tell me how this trial works out." Amora watched her boss exit through the doors. The slam was loud and final.


	16. Chapter 16

A/N: Hi everyone. Sorry for the wait.

-kauppafanit- Thank you so much for your review

-Rin Owens- I'm glad you love this fic, but unfortunately there is only so much I can write.

To all my readers, I'm pretty much out of ideas so the next chapter will probably be the last. Thank you all for reading.

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She didn't know which was more painful: the feeling of betrayal or the deep electrical shock that ran through her body. Tears were freely falling from her eyes and she clenched her fists as if it would help dull the pain. Inhuman screams echoed off the walls and if Amora didn't know better she wouldn't have thought they came from her. The noise sounded more animal like than human. Amora had long since stopped trying to reach whatever humanity that Rick and Craig had. Amora's breaths were becoming chocked. She could hear her screams slow and stop. The pain didn't stop, but she just couldn't scream any longer. She could feel her feet becoming colder.

Amora took a sharp breath. In an instant, all the pain was gone. She couldn't feel her feet; her thrashing stopped. Her body landed heavily on the lab table with a thud that she didn't feel. When she thought about moving, she could hear the mechanical whirling of some device above her head. She was going to call out to Rick, but nothing came out of her mouth. The men's voices sounded further away. Amora closed her eyes as they became heavier and heavier.

Portal ~Portal

The new personality core started with a small shudder. It's violet optic darted around the room trying to assess the situation it found itself in. "She's operational," a male voice stated before a human male appeared in the core's sight. The male had brown hair and green eyes; the core knew that she should recognize the human, but his designation didn't come to mind. "Hey, you know who I am?" the man asked pointing to himself.

The core narrowed her optic and nodded. She knew he worked with Aperture and that he was an adventurer. Once again his name didn't come to her it was as if it was locked away. "Great. Do you know your name?" another male voice asked also appearing into view.

The core looked at the new man who was wearing glasses. She shook her chassis negatively. "Great, another failure," the first man said with a huff.

"Rick, we locked her memories into a zipped file. There's no way she could remember her name. Can you state your purpose, Morality?" the second man asked.

Morality sent a reply through her vocal processor only to get an error message. Morality shook her chassis in a negative motion. "It seems as though the moron messed up again," the second man said with a sigh.

"I'll show him," Rick said reaching above Morality and grabbing her handle. Morality watched as she was pulled off the table she was sitting on. Her optic darted nervously at the strange sensation. She watched as the man carried past a lab table with a woman strapped onto it. She wasn't moving and Morality wondered what happened to her.

The doors to the lab opened and Rick carried the core out and into an elevator. The trip on the elevator was silent. Morality couldn't make a noise or even ask what was happening to her. She knew that she was in Aperture Science and she was born, no, constructed to provide a moral insight to the artificial intelligences in Aperture.

"Hey, this one doesn't work," Rick's voice called out breaking Morality from her train of thoughts. The man Rick called out to a blonde man in a lab coat. Morality recognized him, but she couldn't bring up any specific memory of him.

"Uh, actually that one should work. It's got all of it's memory and should be fully functional," the man said staring at Morality from behind his glasses.

"Well, it can't say anything," Rick said angrily plopping Morality onto the table with a loud thud.

"I don't know why it won't be working. Just leave it here. I'll figure it out. Yup, nothing too difficult for a genius like me," the man rambled.

"You need to get this right. We're running out of time," Rick said before exiting.

The man grumbled irritably as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small box. He mumbled to himself before putting the box away. Morality could read that the man was upset by something. She tried to give him a sympathetic look, but her shutters and handles could only convey so much emotion. "So, uh, Morality, wasn't it? Well, I think that's what Rick said your name is. Let's see. I'll just connect you to my computer and see what is wrong. Don't worry it won't hurt, I think. Do you feel pain? Well, it'll be simulated pain either way. So no need to worry not really pain." The man rambled and Morality raised her bottom shutter in amusement. He looked at the computer screen in thought. "It looks like everything is here. Can you say something for me? Say apple."

Morality tried to do as he asked but the error message appeared again. "Oh, well, that's a little embarrassing. It seems like you are missing your vocal processor which means you understand me. I guess we don't have to tell Rick that. I'm sure the next trial will work fine. Don't move anywhere. I mean, you can't really move by yourself. I'll be back I need to see if Amora came in." The man looked a little pained as he said the name. He touched his pants pocket quickly before hurrying out of the laboratory.

The man came back moments later with disappointment on his face. Morality concluded that he couldn't find whomever he was looking for. He sat with a sigh putting his hands on either side of the core. "Why didn't she come? She wasn't there last night either. She never misses work." Morality shifted in her chassis so she could look at the man. She leaned forward slightly and tried to tap reassuringly on his shoulder.


	17. Chapter 17

A/N: Hey everyone, I haven't updated this fic in forever, I couldn't figure out how to end this story so I hope this will suffice.

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Chell exhausted and shaking made it to the Central AI chamber. The first thing to catch her eye was the large dangling structure in the center of the room. The woman ignored the artificial voice that mocked her. Suddenly a small sphere dropped from the machine hitting the floor with a metallic thud.

Chell ever curious walked up to it. The sphere had a single violet eye that zeroed in on the woman's face. Chell narrowed her eyes at the sphere; to her it was just part of GLaDOS. The woman picked up the core whose violet optic never left her face. Chell didn't notice the inspection from the core, but did find the incinerator chute at one end of the room. The woman carried her unwilling passenger toward the button to open the chute. With a quick set of portals, the woman dropped the violet core down the chute.

Chell watched as the sphere fell. The black of the cores optic grew wide as it fell before settling to normal almost instantaneously. The core's upper shutter lowered and if Chell didn't know better, she would have thought that the core was sad. The woman may have felt a tiny twinge of guilt as the sad expression was replaced with fear. The core's violet iris grew larger as its gaze stared at her. Chell didn't have much time to ponder this before the core disappeared into the red hot flames of the incinerator.

Portal~Portal~Portal~

Morality was jolted out of her memories by the blaring sounds of alerts. The flames of the incinerator were licking at her chassis and there wasn't anything she could do. All Aperture Science Equipment remains operational up to 4000 degrees Kelvin, so Morality knew that she would be burning slowly until her inner circuits were fried. It was a depressing thought or at least it should have been, but Morality had lost those human emotions alongside her humanity.

Her past humanity was also very interesting. Morality knew she should feel something; shock, betrayal, sorrow, lost. But none of these feelings coursed through her circuits. And that was a tragedy in of itself; she was empty. More warnings blared at the core.

She looked up at the distant opening of the chute Chell dropped her down. The personality construct looked for any way up the chute. Of course she couldn't see any; and if she did there wasn't anyway she'll be able to climb it. Morality ignored another alarm.

She shut her optic as she realized that she would slowly burn. Instead of letting the heat slowly fry her circuits, she initiated her sleep mode. Her systems asked if she was sure she wanted to shut down. Morality answered yes. She watched code scroll through her vision and feel slowly as her functions ceased before sending her into darkness.


End file.
